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THE TRAIL RIDER 



The 

TRAIL RIDER 

A ROMANCE OF 
THE KANSAS RANGE 


GEORGE W. OGDEN 

u 

Author of “The Land of Last Chance,” 
“Trail’s End,” etc. 



NEW YORK 

DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY 

1924 











Copyright, 1918-1924, 

By DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY, Inc. 


PRINTED IN U. S. A. 



\ Jp 



VAIL-BALLOU PRESS, INC. 

BINGHAMTON AND NEW YORK 

M 27 '24 1 


©Cl A 7 7 7338 



'ns -v 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTEB PAGE 

I The Man from Texas.1 

II A Female Centaur.19 

III Close Work. 34 

IV The Manhunters.51 

V Four to One.62 

VI The Wanderer’s Return.74 

VII The Listening Man.89 

VIII Interlude ..108 

IX Forbidden Territory.122 

X A Voice to Remember.136 

XI The Test.145 

XII The Stampede.165 

XIII The Cartel.178 

XIV Hartwell Listens.192 

XV The Banjo Note.206 

XVI Discharged.225 

XVII Friends for Ishmael.236 

XVIII An Unexpected Ally.252 

XIX Misunderstanding.262 

XX A Day of Reckoning.276 

XXI The Dark Horizon.292 

XXII A Rendezvous with Death.305 

XXIII Sacrifice Supreme.320 

XXIV Tragedy. 324 

XXV An Amazing Exodus.341 

XXVI Journey’s End.352 




























/ 



I 






THE TRAIL RIDER 


. V 




I 



















•> 























\ 


















THE TRAIL RIDER 


CHAPTER I 

THE MAN PROM TEXAS 

A LL that Boley Drumgoole had gathered in 
his long grazing across the range of life 
was an armful of old white whiskers. 
They were not much to behold, small adornment to 
wear; for they were beginning to turn yellow, like 
a weathered marble tombstone, or wool that has a 
rust in it, or old, dusty whiskers, indeed, that have 
strained tobacco smoke for more than fifty years. 

“Uncle Boley,” he was called, and he was not 
troubled at all over the things which he had missed 
in this world while his talents were being bent to 
the production of that beard, the biggest ever seen 
between the Missouri and the Cimarron. It was 
his mantle and his comforter; it would be his 
shroud. He buttoned it under his vest to keep the 
pleurisy out of his chest when the wind stood north¬ 
east and the wintry days were gray, turning it out 
with the first warm sun of March, like a crocus, 
vain of its endeavor to make a dun world bright. 
Uncle Boley had been an unwilling widower for 
1 


2 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


upward of eighteen years, a circumstance that 
vexed him and hurt his pride. He deplored the 
immorality of a society in which women laughed at 
long, white whiskers, and swore in the same breath 
that if matrimony demanded the sacrifice of them 
he would march on to the grave a single man. No 
woman in the world was worth it. 

While he waited in hope for the reformation of 
society, Uncle Boley supplemented his pension by 
the manufacture of boots for the cowboys and cat¬ 
tlemen, who were thick on the Arkansas Valley 
range of Kansas in those early days. His shop 
was no larger than the front room of his little 
house in Cottonwood, and that was not much bigger 
than a bedstead; his only machinery the primitive 
tools of the bench-worker at his trade. 

He had followed the frontier from Westport, on 
the Missouri line, where he began in the old 
freighting days, and had brought up in Cotton¬ 
wood for his last stand. His fame as a contriver 
of high heels and quilted tops reached as far as 
New Mexico, borne up and down the cattle world 
by the far-riding vaqueros, who held him in the 
first esteem. 

In those days Cottonwood was not so much of a 
town as in time it grew to be, for it was only the 
beginning, indefinite and broad-sown on the tree¬ 
less prairie beside the sandy stream. There had 


THE MAN FROM TEXAS 


3 


been a tree on the site of the town at one time, re¬ 
membered for the hangings which had been carried 
to perfection by the assistance of its friendly 
boughs. From that tree, no trace of which now 
remained, the town had taken its name, and it was 
a new and altogether unlovely place, bleak alike 
under summer sun and winter storm. 

Sod houses with sere grass standing on their 
roofs, as it had begun to grow with the spring rains 
and withered to sapless brown by the summer sun, 
stood in scattered irregularity, like a grazing herd, 
forming the outskirts of the town. Tin cans were 
sown thickly around them, but never vegetable nor 
flower sprung from the willing soil beside their 
walls. 

In the business section the houses were arranged 
with more regularity, as if a future had been 
planned. Most of these buildings were of planks, 
with stubby fronts, appearing as if they had been 
slapped in the face and flattened for their threat¬ 
ened trespass upon the road. 

There was no distinction in living in a sod house 
in Cottonwood, for anybody who could borrow a 
spade might have one. If a man was affluent or 
consequential in any degree, he bought lumber and 
built himself a more aristocratic abode. On this 
account there was a continual sawing and hammer¬ 
ing going on in Cottonwood in those times, for 


4 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


money poured into the place from the great herds on 
the rich prairie lands around. 

The town had been built on cattle, and on cattle 
its hope of future greatness rested. The railroad 
had reached out to it across the sea of prairie like 
the needle of a compass to its pole, and was build¬ 
ing on into the West to open new worlds for canned 
goods to overcome. Out of Cottonwood supplies 
went into this new country, and into Cottonwood 
the wild-eyed herds were driven for shipment, all 
combining to make it a busy place. No restriction 
had been put on the traffic in alcoholic liquor at 
that time in that part of the country, and in Cotton¬ 
wood there was a good deal of lurid life, a right 
smart of shooting and slashing around. Uncle 
Boley Drumgoole had seven pairs of boots, stand¬ 
ing on the little shelf at his back, which had been 
ordered and paid for by men who did not live to 
enjoy them. 

So it was in this atmosphere, if you can sense it 
hurriedly from the little sniff that has been given to 
you here, that Uncle Boley was sewing a bootleg on 
a calm autumn morning, his beard tucked out of 
the way under his left suspender. He was think¬ 
ing on marriage and taking in marriage, as he us¬ 
ually occupied his thoughts when alone, and of the 
correspondence that he had struck up with a lively 
widow in Topeka, when the frame of a man dark- 


THE MAN FROM TEXAS 


5 


ened in the door between him and the bright, glar¬ 
ing day. Uncle Boley looked up from his seam, 
sighing as he relinquished the sweet thoughts of 
the distant widow whom he had never seen, nodded 
to the man, who had paused in his door as if for 
permission to enter, worked his chin rapidly in 
short chops to dislodge the chew of tobacco between 
his jawbone and his cheek. This operation gave 
an aspect of menace to the venerable bootmaker’s 
otherwise placid face, which a stranger was very 
likely to interpret as a prelude to a volley of in¬ 
vective, in keeping with the customs of Cotton¬ 
wood and the wild men who rode that untram¬ 
meled land. 

“Come in,” said Uncle Boley, a little thickly on 
account of the waxed-end that he held in his mouth. 
The man stretched out his arm and, with palm 
against the jamb of the door, stood as one does 
when he has been on his feet a long time, shifting 
his weight from leg to leg, and grinned dustily at 
Uncle Boley. 

Telling about it afterward, when there was 
reason for it and distinction in it, Uncle Boley al¬ 
ways said that grin reminded him of the way a 
strange dog stops to wag its tail and looks up at 
you. There was something half-timid, wholly un¬ 
certain, in the unspoken salutation, yet an appeal 
of friendliness that made a man want to shake 


6 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


hands with him and push him out a cheer. That’s 
the way Uncle Boley always told it; he had felt 
just like he wanted to shake hands with him and 
push him out a cheer. 

“I wonder if I could get a shoe fixed here?” the 
stranger asked. 

Uncle Boley looked him over before replying, the 
waxed-end hanging down his beard. He saw that 
the young fellow was tall and lanky, with steady, 
dark eyes which had a sparkle of humor in them, 
and dark hair that looked as if it needed cutting so 
badly that it must give him pain. But, Uncle 
Boley concluded in the same breath, they’d have 
to rope and hobble that chap to do it, more than 
likely, he looked so skittish and shy. He seemed 
a grave man for his years, which the bootmaker 
estimated at twenty-five or thirty, long-jointed, big- 
nosed, big-handed. Uncle Boley looked at his 
feet; they were made to carry a man. 

“Shoe,” said Uncle Boley, with plain disparage¬ 
ment of that sort of footgear. “Nobody but the 
women and kids around here wears shoes.” 

“I’m a stranger; I’ll get into the customs of the 
country when I learn them.” 

“Yes, you likely will. Now, if you want a good 
pair of boots, dog cheap”—Uncle Boley turned to 
the shelf behind his bench and took down a pair 
that he estimated might fit—“I can fix you up.” 


THE MAN FROM TEXAS 7 

“I’d like to have a pair, but I haven’t got the 
money to buy them.” 

Uncle Boley put them back without a word, an 
expression of loftiness coming over his hairy face. 

“Well*, I don’t reckon I can fix your shoe. I 
ain’t got time to fool with shoes.” 

Uncle Boley took his dangling threads and gave 
them the three little jerks which he always em¬ 
ployed in tightening a stitch. “Where you from?” 

“Topeka, and—Topeka, sir.” 

“Topeky?” Uncle Boley looked up with the 
word, a gleam of eagerness in his sharp, blue eyes. 
“Topeky, heh? Let me see that there shoe.” 

It had cast a heel, as a horse throws a shoe, and 
the stranger had it in his pocket. Uncle Boley 
said it was useless, for it was worn down to nothing 
but the shadow of a heel. He demanded to see the 
other one, and found it just as bad. He bent over 
his work again a little while, as if the case of the 
heels was beyond salvation and he had put it out 
of his mind. 

“Take ’em off,” said he, sewing away, not lift¬ 
ing an eye. “I’ll fix ’em for you.” 

But the young man hesitated. He was con¬ 
cerned about the cost. 

“Well, it won’t make me and it won’t break you,” 
said Uncle Boley, with the largeness of a man to 
whom trifles are annoying. 


8 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


“I’m not so sure about the last part of it, sir.” 

“Well, if you’re that nigh busted, you can stand 
me off till you git a job. I never took the last cent 
out of a man’s pocket in my life.” 

“It must be a comfortable reflection at your age, 
sir.” 

“Well, I ain’t as old as some,” said Uncle Boley 
tartly, “and I’m a danged sight better man ’n many 
a one not half my age!” 

“I didn’t mean to imply that you had reached 
your dotage, sir.” The stranger’s grave, sensitive 
face reddened at the old man’s heat. The flush 
appeared to increase his homeliness. For he was 
undoubtedly homely, but with a good plainness, 
Uncle Boley thought, like a man who would be kind 
to a horse or a woman. 

“I’m as good as any man of forty-seven you can 
find in this country!” 

Uncle Boley jerked his threads a bit sharply as 
he spoke, watching the stranger’s face with sly, up¬ 
ward glancing of his wise old eyes which belied his 
apparent ill temper. 

“Yes, and most of them at forty, I’ll bet you a 
purty, sir.” 

There was a softness in the stranger’s speech, a 
drawl in his words, that had marked him from 
the moment that he opened his mouth as somewhere 


THE MAN FROM TEXAS 9 

from the South, primarily, even though Topeka 
just now. Uncle Boley nodded. 

“From Texas, I ’low?” 

“Yes, sir; I was bornd and raised in Taixas.” 

“What might they call you where you come from, 
son?” 

“Why, they call me Taixas, sir—Taixas Hart¬ 
well, James or Jim christened, if you prefer it, sir.” 

“Texas suits me all right. Them two names 
goes together handy, too—easy to say—Texas 
Hartwell. Jimses and James is too thick already 
in this man’s country; yes, and jim-jamses, too.” 

“Yes, sir.” 

Uncle Boley worked at the seam until he had 
used up the thread in the leather, then took the ex¬ 
tra waxed-end out of his mouth and put the boot 
aside. He took up one of the crippled shoes, 
turned it, examined it, as if he had come across 
some curiosity in the shoemaker’s art. 

“You must ’a’ done a sight of walkin’ in them 
shoes.” 

“I have walked a right smart little stretch in ’em, 
sir.” 

“I don’t reckon all the way from Topeky?” 

“Not all the way, sir.” 

Uncle Boley hammered at the new lift of heel 
that he was laying on, brads in his mouth, a smudge 


10 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


of neat’s foot oil on his bald head. The stranger 
sat reading a bill that hung on the wall at the 
ancient bootmaker’s back. 

This poster was an advertisement of an event 
that was going forward in Cottonwood that very 
day—a three days’ fair celebrating the annual con¬ 
vention of the Cattle Raisers’ Association. It was 
a modest announcement, in small type, but it 
seemed to draw the stranger into it as if it held 
matter of the first importance. 

“ Don’t reckon you know anybody name of Gertie 
Moorehead up there in Topeky, do you?” 

Uncle Boley spoke in casual manner, as if he 
might be inquiring after a distant relative, or some¬ 
body who owed him money that he never expected 
to collect. He pretended to be altogether centered 
in fitting another lift on the heel, keeping his eyes 
on it, making a little hissing noise through his teeth. 

The young man started, reddened, took his eyes 
off the advertisement of the fair, as if he had been 
caught stealing leather. 

“Who, sir?” 

“Lady name of Gertie Moorehead,” Uncle Boley 
repeated, still too busy to lift his eyes. 

“No, sir; I can’t say that I do, sir. I’m not very 
largely acquainted in that city, scarcely acquainted 
at all, sir.” 

“Oh, I reckon you just passed through,” said 


THE MAN FROM TEXAS 


11 


Uncle Boley, plainly disappointed. He was, in a 
measure, indignant, too, having been taken in that 
way by the expectation, the hope, that this stranger 
raised in his breast. He had been all of a tremble 
in his eagerness to hear a first-hand description of 
the lady whose photograph was in the drawer right 
there in the shop that moment, and to learn whether 
her representation of property, real and personal, 
was true, or colored for matrimonial purposes. 
He had been drawn into mending a pair of shoes, 
and for a man who had no money, on that hope. 
But instead of being a resident of Topeka, this man 
had only passed through—tramped through, Uncle 
Boley was ready to bet money—and didn’t knol^ 
Gertie from Gilderoy’s goose. 

Uncle Boley knocked away at the heel with vin¬ 
dictive blows, his whiskers working from the an¬ 
chorage of his suspender in his vehemence. He 
stopped to tuck them back again and roll his eyes 
sourly at Texas Hartwell, who sat there with his 
gaze glued on the bill advertising the fair as if he 
had discovered the rarest piece of literature on the 
globe. 

“What kind of a job ’re you lookin’ for?” 

Another jump away from the poster, another 
swift flame of blood in the bleak and bony face 
of Texas Hartwell. 

“Sir?” 


12 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


“I said what kind of a job ’re you lookin’ for, if 
you’re lookin’ for any?” 

“ ’Most any kind.” 

“Can you tend bar?” 

“Well, I never did, sir.” 

“Maybe you can deal faro?” 

“I’m afraid I’d fail to give satisfaction at it, 
sir.” 

“Huh!” said Uncle Boley, in the manner of a 
man who had so little faith that it almost amounted 
to contempt. Presently he brightened a bit and 
looked up hopefully. 

“Can you cook or carpenter?” 

Texas smiled, a smile that illuminated his face 
like a light within. He shook his head slowly, 
fighting the smile back to the corners of his mouth, 
the corners of his dark eyes. 

“No, sir. I wouldn’t be a bit of good at either 
of them.” 

“Huh!” said Uncle Boley, with a little more 
stress on it than before. 

He returned to his work with the air of a man 
who knew himself to be in for a bad job, and de¬ 
termined to have it off his hands as soon as pos¬ 
sible. Uncle Boley had canvassed the list of pos¬ 
sibilities in Cottonwood for a man who wore shoes. 
Outside of the arts and crafts named nobody went 
around in shoes; and if a man who wore them could 


THE MAN FROM TEXAS 


13 


neither deal, tend bar, cook, nor carpenter, there 
was no place for him in the activities of the town. 
Even the lawyers and doctors wore boots like reg¬ 
ular men. 

“I was thinkin’ I might get something to do 
around the cattle ranches, sir.” 

“Huh! Did you ever see a horse?” 

“Yes, sir; I’ve seen ’em, sir.” 

“Well, was you ever on one?” 

“I’ve had some little experience around ’em, 
sir.” 

“In a livery barn, I reckon.” Uncle Boley was 
at no pains to conceal his contempt. 

“I was raised up on a cattle ranch, sir,” Texas 
said gravely, rather loftily, “and I can ride a horse 
and throw a rope with any man between Taixas and 
Montana, sir. If it’s the shoes—” 

“Well, it was the shoes!” Uncle Boley smote 
the one on his knee a disdainful blow. “No man 
that ever rode after cattle ain’t got no right to lower 
hisself down to shoes!” 

“A man can’t always choose what he’ll put on 
his feet, sir, any more than he can select the road 
they’re to follow.” 

Uncle Boley sat a little while, his eyes on the un¬ 
finished heel. When he spoke it was with a new 
note of respect, a gentleness and softness more be¬ 
coming to the wisdom of his years. , 


14 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


“You’re right; you’re mighty right. A man can 
be a man and wear shoes, but”—forcefully—“he 
ort to git out of ’em as quick as he can! ” 

“I was just a readin’ on that bill, sir, that they’re 
goin’ to have a ropin’ contest for both men and 
ladies at the fair here this afternoon. I never 
heard of ladies bein’ admitted to that rough sport 
before.” 

“This is the first time they’ve ever had ’em mixed 
up in it here. Ain’t a woman’s place to go strad¬ 
dlin’ around on a horse ropin’ and hog-tyin’ steers. 
I had a wife or daughter tried it, I’d turn her over 
m’ knee, that’s what I’d do!” 

“They’re not to compete against the men, sir, 
it says.” 

“Don’t make no difference; they ain’t got no 
business competin’ around at all. Well, I will 
make one exception—but I grudge that one.” 

“Is there any entrance fee for contestants, or do 
you know?” 

“It’s as free as air. Anybody that’s got a horse 
and a rope— Why don’t you try it, if you’re a 
roper?” 

“I’ve been sittin’ here tryin’ to study up some 
plan to do it. The bill says first prize for men is 
two hundred and fifty dollars. Do you reckon they 
mean it?” 


THE MAN FROM TEXAS IS 

“Well, I wouldn’t advise you to go down there 
to the fair grounds and ask ’em that!” 

“I was just thinkin’ that if I had a horse I 
might try my hand.” 

Uncle Boley looked him over again, this time $ 
more carefully than at the first inventory. 

Except for the shoes, he wasn’t materially differ¬ 
ent from the general run of cowboys. He had the 
slender, pliant waist and lean hams of the saddle- 
man ; and long, strong arms, which looked as if they 
could swing and throw a lariat. Indeed, he wore 
the conventional hat of a cowboy, and the gray^ 
laced flannel shirt. His trousers seemed to be a 
little odd, but that was, perhaps, on account of no 
boots. Boots to the knees make a great difference 
in a man’s legs, as Uncle Boley knew. 

“What kind of a job did you work at last?” 

“I never had a job in my life, sir.” 

“I thought you said you was raised on a ranch?” 

Uncle Boley looked at him sharply. 

“My father’s ranch.” 

Uncle Boley seemed to take a new and deep in- v 
terest in his work. He pegged away for fully ten 
minutes with never a word, and scarcely a look in 
the direction of his doubtful customer. By pres¬ 
sure of habit he had taken up the waxed-end and 
put it in his mouth, and when he spoke, at length, 


16 THE TRAIL RIDER 

he mumbled around it, as if he communed to him¬ 
self. 

“I guess every man knows why he left and where 
he’s bound for. I know I left Mezoury one time 
’cause I killed a feller’s dog. Yes, sir, that dang 
man was goin’ to shoot me.” 

“I never killed anybody’s dog in my life,” said 
Texas. 

He was looking out into the street, but with that 
in his eyes eyes which told the old man his thoughts 
were far away from the scene before him. People 
were passing, afoot and on horse, and the dust of 
their coming and going was blowing lazily on the 
soft, autumn wind; but Texas could not have told 
whether they were men or cattle, and Uncle Boley 
would have bet a handful of tacks on that. 

“A man don’t have to kill a dog,” the old man 
suggested. 

“Sir?” said Texas, with that peculiar start, that 
unaccountable mounting of color, to his brown, 
tough face. 

“I said a man might run off with some other fel¬ 
ler’s wife,” said Uncle Boley, very sarcastically, 
speaking loudly, as if to a deaf person. 

“He might,” Texas allowed, his all-transforming 
smile moving the corners of his eyes again, “but I 
assure you, sir, I never did.” 

Uncle Boley looked at him comically a moment, 


THE MAN FROM TEXAS 


17 


bent over his work, and laughed, his old high- 
keyed, dry-leather laugh. It was no small 
triumph, if Texas had known it, to pull a laugh 
out of cynical old Uncle Boley. He didn’t say a 
word more until he had the last tack driven, the 
newness of the repaired heels duly disguised by 
blacking, after the ancient custom of his craft. 
Then he handed the shoes over to their owner, 
shook his head, took the waxed-end out of his 
mouth. 

“No, I’ll bet a button you never did!” said he, 
and laughed again, with such deep gusto it made 
him cough. 

Texas put on his shoes, stood to try them, 
stamped this foot and that, thrust his hand into 
his pocket, and inquired how much it was. 

“Dollar,” said Uncle Boley, turning his head as 
if ashamed of mentioning such a trifle. 

Texas produced it, but Uncle Boley pretended to 
be absorbed in something transpiring in the street. 
Texas put it on the bench before him, apology in 
his movement, and started for the door. 

“How much does that leave you?” Uncle Boley 
asked. 

“Sufficient for immediate needs, sir, thank you.” 

“Yes, and I’ll bet you couldn’t match it if your 
neck depended on it!” 

Which was true, and Uncle Boley knew it was 


18 THE TRAIL RIDER 

true by the signs that came into the lanky Texan’s 
face. 

“Here”—handing out the dollar—“I said I’d 
trust you till you struck a job. You take this 
money, and go and spend it over there at the Buf¬ 
falo Waller cafe for something that ’ll stick to your 
ribs, and when you’ve done that, come back here 
and we’ll see about a horse for that there ropin’ 
doin’s this afternoon.” 

“If you could help me to a horse, sir!” said 
Texas, brightening so wonderfully that he seemed 
like another man. 

“Well, maybe I can.” 

“And if I win the purse—” 

“Wouldn’t be surprised if you did.” 

“I’ll split it with you, sir!” 

“Yes, an’ you won’t do no such a dam’ thing! 
Go on over there and put something under your 
shirt to work on. It takes beefsteak and taters to 
give a man the stren’th to throw a steer.” 


CHAPTER II 


A FEMALE CENTAUR 

U NCLE BOLEY was the proudest man on 
the fair grounds that afternoon when 
Texas came over from the office with the 
money in his hand. The old man was in the very 
first row of the grand stand, his whiskers combed 
out to their mightiest, his face glowing like a Santa 
Claus mask. 

“It was as purty a piece of ropin’ as I ever seen, 
Texas,” he declared, going forward to meet the 
young man, as proud of the admiration in the 
ladies’ eyes, the complimentary comment of cow¬ 
men and cowboys around him, as if the stranger 
were his son. 

“It wasn’t such a scan’lous hard piece of work 
with that horse of yours, sir. He’s the finest cow- 
pony I ever threw a leg over, sir, and the smartest.” 

The old man’s eyes softened with a mist of ten¬ 
derness at this praise. 

“I raised that horse from a colt, but I didn’t 
teach him them tricks, Texas. It was a girl that 
broke him in to handle cattle.” 

“Why, sir, you don’t tell me!” 

19 


20 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


Texas looked at Uncle Boley with amazement in 
his face. Animated by his success he seemed 
younger and livelier by many years than when he 
had stood in the shop-door a few hours before, dusty 
and roadworn, hungry and downhearted. 

“You’ll see her purty soon—she’s in this here 
ladies’ contest that’s cornin’ next. Well, if there’s 
any excuse for any girl in Kansas bein’ in it, that 
girl’s Sallie McCoy. I would take down the bars 
for Sallie, for she’s a lady, no matter what she 
does.” 

“I’m sure she is, sir; the actions of that little 
horse tell me as much.” 

“She’ll ride him when she goes in. You’ll have 
a chance to see his work.” 

“She’ll ride him? Why, if I’d ’a’ known it, sir 
—it wasn’t fair of me to use him and tire him all 
out! ” 

“That’s all right; he’s able to stand it and never 
turn a hair.” 

“But if I’d ’a’ known that you intended to let 
her ride him, I never would ’a’ thrown a leg over 
him, sir.” 

“I ain’t a lettin’ her use him—it was her that 
lent him to us—she owns him.” 

Texas looked at him with fallen countenance 
most woeful to behold. Injured pride flushed his 


A FEMALE CENTAUR 21 

cheeks, humiliation lurked in his eyes like the pain 
of a wound. 

“But I understood you to say, sir—” 

“That I raised him. I did; but I give him to 
Sallie five years ago. If you think runnin’ down 
and ropin’ one fool chuckleheaded steer’s a goin’ to 
wind that horse, then you’ve got another guess 
cornin’ to you, young feller.” 

“But I’m scan’lous sorry, just the same. I feel 
like I’d taken a mean advantage of a lady’s gener¬ 
osity; I feel—just like—a whipped pup! ” 

Uncle Boley passed if off with a grunt, taking it 
all as a reflection on the endurance of the horse. 
He spread his big red handkerchief on the rough 
board seat for which he had paid two dollars, and 
nodded for Texas to compose himself beside him. 

“Two dollars for a piece of board a foot and a 
half long!” he protested. “Might know it wasn’t 
any bunch of cowmen that got this thing up. Keep 
a man pickin’ splinters out of his britches for the 
next month!” 

“Didn’t the cowmen get it up, sir? I under¬ 
stood from the bill—” 

“Yes, but it wasn’t the association; the associa¬ 
tion didn’t have nothing to do with the fair. 
They’re holding the convention here, all right, but 
a crowd of Wichita men, and some of the light- 


22 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


heels of this town, got up this show to rastle a few 
more dollars away from folks.” 

“Well, they sure have succeeded,” said Texas, 
sweeping a quick look over the crowded grand 
stand. 

Uncle Boley nodded, but did not look about him. 
Instead, he was surveying Texas, with every evi¬ 
dence of satisfaction in his glowing face. He had 
insisted on boots, and had found a pair among the 
unclaimed ones on his shelf that fitted Texas as if 
they had been measured for him. It made a great 
difference in the young man’s legs, Uncle Boley 
reflected; it gave him the shape and proportions of 
a proper man. 

“Yes, and there’ll be a heap of money put up on 
Sallie McCoy,” the old man said, twisting his head 
to express magnitude; “scads and piles of it. 
Every cowman and puncher in fifty miles is here to 
put his money on Sallie. Pore as I am, I rolled 
up a little and put it on her, and if I had more, 
I’d resk it too, by Ned!” 

Texas jumped to his feet, seeing here an opening 
to express his gratitude. 

“I’ll put up a hundred apiece for us!” 

“I don’t encourage gamblin’,” said the old man 
sagely; “but when I run into a bunch of light-heels 
that’s achin’ to git rid of their money, I’m bound 
to help ’em all I can. Put it up for yourself, if 


A FEMALE CENTAUR 


23 


you want to, but I ain’t a goin’ to split that money 
with you, and I told you that at the start.” 

Moved by his sense of obligation to this unknown 
Sallie McCoy, Texas went down to post a bet on 
her. From what the old man had said, he expected 
to find the odds largely in her favor, and was not 
a little surprised to learn that it was the other way. 
There was no lack of money at two to one against 
Sallie McCoy, and the friends and supporters of 
that young lady were covering it as fast as they 
could count. 

On all sides he heard it expressed that somebody 
was in for a shearing. The fact that strangers 
should come from Wichita and bet against the local 
favorite was hotly resented. It was being said that 
they had offered odds to bring out the money, and 
the challenge was working very well. 

Texas crossed over to where a crowd stood round 
a pen in which the steers were confined, hoping that 
he might get a glimpse of Sallie McCoy among the 
contestants, who were waiting on the other side of 
the big corral gate. There were three girls looking 
over the animals, which were soon to fall before 
their cunning hands, making wise comments on 
the points of strength and speed which the steers 
presented. They were range-roughened girls, 
browned by sun and wind, dressed in divided skirts, 
with more or less savage trinkery and ornamenta- 


24 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


tion on their hats and belts. He did not believe 
that Sallie McCoy was among them. 

These were the kind of girls whom the cowboys 
flung heels-high in their rough dances; strong- 
armed, broad-chested, afraid of neither man nor 
beast. He believed Sallie McCoy must be out of 
a more delicate mold than these. 

One of the judges rode into the arena to an¬ 
nounce the rules governing this contest, which were 
somewhat different from those under which the men 
had competed. 

Each contestant was to enter the arena alone, 
after having selected the steer upon which she was 
to practise her art from the number 'in the pen. 
The animal was to be allowed a running start be¬ 
fore the rope was thrown. No assistance would be 
given, except in the event that the contestant be¬ 
came entangled or otherwise imperiled. A man 
with a megaphone would announce before the grand 
stand each contestant’s name as she entered, and the 
time it took her to throw and hog-tie the steer, when 
she had accomplished that feat. 

The first girl was mounting her horse as Texas 
turned to go back to Uncle Boley; but at that mo¬ 
ment one entered the enclosure where the contest¬ 
ants waited whose appearance rooted his feet to the 
ground. Texas drew himself up to his toes to look 
at her as she swept past the other girls, giving them 


A FEMALE CENTAUR 


25 


an indifferent, rather superior, glance as she passed. 

She was dressed in green velvet bolero and di¬ 
vided skirt, with silver buttons down the outside 
seams of this wide, trouser-like garment. Her lit¬ 
tle spurs were silver, a silver ornament held back 
the brim of her broad hat, showing the engaging 
sweep of her abundant dark hair over her dainty 
ear. Her skin was of a tender whiteness, reddened 
on cheek and lip by nature’s own cosmetics, in fine 
contrast with her brilliant habit and dark eyes. 
She was handsome, and so well aware of it that 
there was a certain haughtiness in her carriage, near 
neighbor to disdain. 

Texas thought she was the most superb human 
being he ever had seen. He did not believe that 
it was possible that she could sit a saddle against 
the shock of a roped steer, or leap to the ground, 
while her horse strained on the taut lariat, and run 
with rope in hand and secure the thrown creature’s 
wild-striving legs. 

Could this ripe beauty, this voluptuous creature, 
be Sallie McCoy? Texas was all of a-quiver to 
find out. He saw that the officials of the fair paid 
her the utmost deference, fairly jumping in their 
eagerness to make a place for her as she set her 
dainty foot on the plank of the stock-pen and 
climbed up to get a better view of the arena. 

He hurried back to ask Uncle Boley about her,' 


26 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


arriving before the grand stand to find that the 
passage leading into the arena had been blocked 
completely by late arrivals, chiefly women. He 
was too timid, too considerate, to disturb them. 
Uncle Boley saw him, and waved his hand under¬ 
standing^. 

Texas took up his station in front of the grand 
stand with the fringe of favored ones who had been 
allowed to penetrate that far, and one came past 
on a horse to warn them back close against the wall, 
and to caution them that they would have to look 
out for themselves when things began to pop be¬ 
tween the ladies and the steers. 

Texas watched the work of the first three girls 
keenly. Two of them were ordinary; one was ex¬ 
cellent. But none of them was Sallie McCoy. 
But he had not expected one of them to turn out to 
be Sallie McCoy. Surely it was the girl in the 
velvet dress who was Sallie; and yet—there was 
something deeper in his heart that denied this; why, 
he could not tell. Perhaps it was because she was 
grander than he had pictured Uncle Boley’s friend 
to be, and bolder, perhaps, if that word might be 
permitted in the description of a lady. 

The grand stand was going wild over the last 
girl. She was the comeliest of the three whom he 
had seen in the corral, and he thought that if she 




A FEMALE CENTAUR 


27 


was not one of the “queens of the range” which the 
poster had announced, then she was a princess, at 
least. The spectators appeared to hold the same 
opinion. They would not be satisfied until she had 
ridden past, modest and blushing, her hair in dis¬ 
order from her struggle with the steer, her hat in 
her hand. Sallie McCoy would have to go a pretty 
good pace to beat that girl’s time, Texas thought, 
and began to fear for her reputation. 

He looked again toward the stock-pen. There 
another girl had appeared on horse-back, and— 
there was no mistaking it—the very horse that he 
had ridden to a winning finish not more than an 
hour before. So that would be Sallie McCoy, be¬ 
yond a doubt, and it was not the gorgeous lady in 
the velvet dress and silver spurs. 

Anything, indeed, but gorgeous this little lady 
appeared as she rode into the arena and came to 
a stop not a rod from the spot where Texas stood. 
She was dressed plainly in a loose, shirtlike upper 
garment, laced at the front in the cowboy style, a 
modest blue necktie tucked into the bosom. Her 
gray blouse disappeared under the broad belt 
around her waist, with a plain suggestion of a tail 
to it equal to any cowboy’s shirt on the Arkansas 
Valley range that day. The skirt was of corduroy, 
divided into voluminous trousers, set with large 


28 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


mother-of-pearl buttons down the legs. She wore 
no spurs; her tawny, weathered hat was weighted 
by a heavy leather band. 

The sun had turned to a reddish tint the ends 
and light-flying tresses of her heavy, brown hair 
and had set its little brown pigment spots in her 
fine-textured skin, like marks of kisses from the lips 
of an ardent lover. Her eyes were as brown as 
walnut, and sorrowful as a Madonna’s, but in the 
sorrow of innocence, whose only grief is for a 
dream. 

She saw Uncle Boley up there among the great 
crowd, and smiled. Texas felt a quiver leap 
through his body at the sight of her quickened face, 
as if she had come and laid her hand on his head. 
It was just like that, he thought; just exactly as if 
she had come and laid her hand on his bare head. 
And her smile was not for him at all; as far as he 
was concerned, her world was empty of men. But 
if a smile going over a man’s head could make 
him quiver and tingle like that, how would he feel 
if she gave it to him, right square in the eyes? 

That was what Texas wondered, the velvet lady 
in her glory dim in his thoughts that moment, as 
Sallie McCoy’s name was announced by the man 
with the megaphone and the gate was opened to the 
wildest steer on the waiting list. 

It was a white animal with a blotch of red across 


A FEMALE CENTAUR 29 

its loins—the meanest color that a steer could be, 
and Texas knew it—long-legged, long-horned, and 
it carried its head high when it rushed out of the 
pen, as if it was bound for its native Texas and 
dared any man to stop it on the way. Of course 
there was a certain advantage in a fast one, Texas 
reflected, for the faster it went, the harder it would 
fall. But he had his doubts on the ability of this 
slender girl, with her small, brown hands, being 
able to do much with that native of the chaparral. 

“He’s a regular catamount! ” said Texas aloud. 

“You said it, pardner,” agreed a short, bow- 
legged man, with a narrow face and long nose, and 
great black mustache drooping under it like a 
mourning wreath. 

The three judges were mounted, waiting in front 
of the grand stand to dash out and time the con¬ 
testant, time beginning the moment that the lariat 
was thrown. The contestant was allowed the pre¬ 
liminary maneuvering to warm up her horse, lim¬ 
ber her arms, and work the steer up in front of 
the grand stand if she had that desire. 

Texas saw from the start that this girl had no 
such intention. Her aim was to get it over with 
while her horse was fresh. But the steer seemed 
to have some crafty design of his own for making 
a figure in the world. Texas never had seen a 
swifter one, and few as wild. The animal dashed 


30 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


around the arena in long leaps, like a deer, yet far 
out of reach of her lariat, and at every circle past 
the grand stand the enthusiasm of the spectators 
grew. 

Here at last was the real thing; here was a show 
for your money, a thing to make you lift in your 
seat and feel a thrill up your backbone when that 
handsome girl went by, swift as a leaf on the wind, 
a whirl of dust behind her, her slender limbs hold¬ 
ing her to the saddle as lissom as a sapling in a 
gale. 

Accustomed as these people were to seeing men 
and women tearing about the town on horseback, 
there was a quality in this girl’s exhibition of rid¬ 
ing that held their breath in admiration. There 
was no thought as to when it would end, or how, 
only the present wonder of her plastic figure and 
the moving appreciation of her grace and com¬ 
petence, as she went dashing across the dusty field. 

Down in the front where Texas and the bow- 
legged man stood there was some concern lest the 
long-winded steer might outlast her horse. 

“That feller’s a wind-splitter from Arkansaw!” 
said the bow-legged man. 

“He sure is built for speed,” Texas replied, his 
anxious eyes on the whirl of dust through which 
pursuer and pursued were dimly seen. 

“He’s a racehorse, cuss him!” The bow-legged 


A FEMALE CENTAUR 


31 


man pushed forward a little as he spoke, and 
leaned as if concentrating his faculties to influence 
the steer. “Now! That’s the girl—that’s the 
girl!” 

The encouraging exclamation had been drawn 
from him by Sallie’s sudden maneuver. Quitting 
the pursuit of the steer, throwing her weight across 
the saddle to swerve her horse sharply, she cut 
across the arena and intercepted the flying animal 
directly in front of the place where Texas and the 
bow-legged man stood. 

The steer stiffened his legs and slid in his sur¬ 
prised attempt to escape the trap, wheeled, snorted 
defiance, and made off on a back track. But his 
checked race had been fatal to his spectacular cal¬ 
culations, if calculations he had inside his wild, 
long-horned head. Before he could get back to 
his lost gait Sallie had swung and cast her reata. 

It fell true to the mark. Her watchful horse 
stiffened in his tracks, braced himself, lunged back, 
as Sallie half flung herself from the saddle on the 
opposite side to set her weight against the shock. 
In a second there was a glimpse of wild-flying legs 
as eight hundred pounds of steer struggled against 
the tight-strung lariat to get to its feet again. 

The grand stand started a cheer when the steer 
was thrown, but bit it off as if the door of its emo¬ 
tion had been opened untimely. There was not 


32 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


the sound of a sigh as Sallie ran to the struggling, 
bellowing animal, her hobble in her hand. The 
rest of it was only a flash through a cloud of dust. 

The grand stand stood to see, and did see, a deft 
movement of hand and rope, and the next breath, 
it seemed, the girl standing back out of the dust 
and confusion. The steer was lying there winded, 
its four legs gathered and bound like a hog trussed 
up for market. 

Sallie’s wise horse, knowing very well when the 
work was done, eased the strain on the rope, and 
the grand stand, freed of its tension at the same mo¬ 
ment, outdid itself in cheering. The judges re¬ 
leased the conquered steer, faced the shouting peo¬ 
ple, held up hands for silence. Sallie remounted 
and rode forward with them, and her friends came 
scrambling over the rail by scores to congratulate 
her. 

The man with the megaphone announced her 
time. This was seven seconds better than the best 
made so far, and the opinion was confidently and 
freely expressed that it could not be beaten. The 
bow-legged man was so sure of this that he produced 
money which, he said, stood ready to back that be¬ 
lief against all comers. 

Texas saw a tall, soft-shouldered, puffy man, 
whose black eyebrows were in sharp contrast with 
the scraped-hog whiteness of his skin, come for- 


A FEMALE CENTAUR 


33 


ward and engage the bow-legged man’s money. 
The judges, as an escort of honor, rode w r ith Sallie 
to the corral gate, where she continued in her saddle 
waiting to see the finish. 

The man with the megaphone cleared the arena 
for the closing feature. 


CHAPTER III 


CLOSE WORK 

T EXAS worked his way round to where Sallie 
McCoy waited on her horse just inside the 
corral gate. The bow-legged man was 
talking with her, combing her horse’s mane with 
his fingers. 

“They’d just as well hand you the money right 
now, Miss Sallie,” he said. 

“You’re too sure, Mr. Winch,” she returned, 
laughing a little, all rosy through the faint brown 
of her face and neck. 

Texas Hartwell drew a few slow steps nearer, ' 
something timid in his way, to hear again the vi¬ 
brant music of her voice. What marvels the world 
held for him that day, he thought; what a vast 
amount of beauty and sensation it had been keeping 
from him here in this far-away place. First the 
one in velvet had taken away his breath, and now 
this one seemed to be calling the very heart out 
of his breast. In spite of his efforts to hold it an¬ 
chored, he knew its peril was great. 

“I don’t know who this Wichita lady is,” the man 
whom she had called Winch went on, “but I’ll bet 
34 


CLOSE WORK 35 

seven dollars to one she can’t come in half a min¬ 
ute of you.” 

“I hope you didn’t bet any money on me,” she 
said, a bit reproachfully. 

Yes, the other one was handsome, with a disdain¬ 
ful, haughty lift to her white chin, thought Texas, 
but this one was good. A man could look right 
down into her eyes, he’d bet, and see the bottom 
of her soul all white like pebbles in a spring. 

“Didn’t we?” Winch wanted to know, with a 
large discount in his tone. It was as much as if 
he had asked her how any gentleman could stand 
aside with money in his pocket and fail to hazard 
it in the honor of his community, and the heart and 
jewel of that community, and hope to hold his head 
up in the eyes of men again. It was a feeling in 
which Texas shared, and warmed with the gener¬ 
osity of it, his heart applauding the little bow- 
legged man. 

Miss Sallie smiled down to Mr. Winch. Appre¬ 
ciation honestly bestowed, thought Texas. There 
was not the girl to go about throwing smiles away 
as if they were trifles to be had for the looking. 
A man might well leap to catch a smile like that, 
and put it away in his heart to keep, like a rare 
poem that has moved his soul. 

Mr. Winch did not appear to suspend his breath¬ 
ing on account of it. Texas wondered why. On 


36 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


the other hand, Mr. Winch was doing some smiling 
himself, of a rather mirthless and sardonic kind, 
which lifted his great black mustache as a cat moves 
its lip before a spring. Peculiar teeth Mr. Winch 
had, slanting outward, giving his lips a bulge. 
They gave one the thought that he must have be¬ 
gun very early in his life gnawing, like a beaver, 
on some hard substance. 

“We went the limit, Miss Sallie,” he said, “and 
I’ve got just seven old bony dollars left that say 
Miss Fannie Goodnight, nor no other woman from 
Wichita or anywhere else, can come inside of thirty 
seconds of matchin’ your time.” 

“I’d be sorry if any of you boys were to lose 
money on me. Maybe she’ll beat me.” 

“Wait till she does,” said Winch, in high con¬ 
fidence of security. “Well, here she comes, and 
sa-ay people! Look at that ani-mile!” 

A bony red steer was passing from the cattle pen 
into the arena. It was so thin and flat that its ribs 
could have been counted at twenty yards. The 
creature was slow and spiritless, seemingly bowed 
under the weight of its great branching horns. It 
stopped a few rods beyond the gate and stood with 
its head down, as if its race had been run long ago 
and it hadn’t the strength to carry it another hun¬ 
dred yards. 

Sallie McCoy beheld the creature with amaze- 


CLOSE WORK 37 

ment, a flush of indignation burning in her face. 

“That thing wasn’t in the corral!” 

The girl who had made the next best record to 
Sallie shook her head. 

“They drove it in from back there,” she said. 
“It’s not on the square—they’re goin’ to let her 
rope a ghost.” 

Texas Hartwell looked hard at the lean and life¬ 
less, desiccated, mangy steer. He stood as if par¬ 
alyzed by amazement, incredulity in every line of 
his solemn face. Presently he walked back to 
the judges, taking the ground in immense strides, 
like a man who was either very angry or very 
earnest. 

“Gentle-men, you’re not goin’ to permit this, 
surely?” He spoke in what seemed a gentle pro¬ 
test. The judges looked down on him indiffer¬ 
ently. “Why gentle-men, that thing ain’t an ani¬ 
mal—it’s a dead carcass!” 

“We’re judges of this game, young man,” the 
eldest of the trio said. 

He was a man of congested face and bleached- 
linen whiteness of hair which told of alcoholic cur¬ 
ing. His purple lips were thick, his teeth black 
and broken, his eyes rimmed with red. A little line 
of scraggy white brows marked sharply the ag¬ 
gravated redness of his skin. 

Texas marked him well, in slow and silent look, 


38 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


as if gathering points of identification against the 
meeting of another day. The slow calm scrutiny 
nettled the man; he spoke sharply: 

“We can take care of this without any of your 
help.” 

“I allow that, gentle-men,” Texas yielded, re¬ 
spectfully, “but I tell you, sirs, I could stand off 
twenty feet and blow that pore old onery beast over 
with my breath! The young lady that just fin¬ 
ished roped and hobbled one of the wildest ani¬ 
mals I ever saw. I want to see her given a square 
deal, gentle-men; that’s all I ask of you.” 

“Who in the Billy Hell are you?” the youngest 
of the judges sneered. 

That sweeping flush which seemed the leap¬ 
ing pulse of his deepest emotion flooded the 
young man’s face. He stood as if biting a 
nail, the hard muscles of his lean jaw swell¬ 
ing, holding himself in with an effort. His voice 
was steady and calm, soft and low, when he re¬ 
plied: “If it was necessary for you to know, to 
insure justice where justice is due, I could tell you, 
sir. I assure you that I’m as well known to you 
as to the young lady I’m speaking in behalf of, 
sir.” 

The man with the megaphone was announcing 
Miss Fannie Goodnight, of Wichita. Cheers 
greeted her name, but they were blurred by a ques- 


CLOSE WORK 


39 


tioning murmur, which broke into derisive calls 
here and there, and loud shrill questions from cow¬ 
boy throats as to the family of the animal before 
them. 

“You’ll have to get out of here!” ordered the 
red-faced man. 

“Clear out—get back over there!” 

The youngest of the judges spurred forward, 
reined in short, brought his horse to its haunches 
two yards from where Texas stood. The lean, sol¬ 
emn cattleman did not give an inch, but looked the 
other such a challenge, eye to eye, as would have 
meant, under other circumstances, the slinging of 
guns. He turned slowly and went back to the cor¬ 
ral gate, where Sallie McCoy was waiting, her face 
white, a shadow of terror in her sad brown eyes. 

Winch looked at Texas curiously, but did not 
speak, for at that moment Fannie Goodnight started 
on her conquest of the apathetic steer. She was 
well mounted, and handled her long-legged horse 
with every evidence of much experience in the 
saddle. 

As she rode into the field the steer lifted his sad 
head and trotted to the center, where he stood, en¬ 
tirely unmoved by the scene so widely different from 
the pastures of his youth. He displayed a little 
burst of kindling spirit when the velvet-clad beauty 
made a dash for him, her reata whirling over her 


40 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


head, even giving her a race round the enclosure 
that had in it a promise of surprise. The bony 
creature’s unexpected nimbleness provoked laugh¬ 
ter and cheers, and genuine expressions of admira¬ 
tion when he checked himself in full career, swerv¬ 
ing and dodging like a dog. 

It would have passed off very creditably for Miss 
Goodnight if she had been wise enough to know 
exactly when to put a stop to this play. But she 
worked the poor old steer at his tricks so long that 
she uncovered her hand. 

“He’s trained for it! I’ll bet money she’s been 
puttin’ him through them tricks for the last six 
months, gettin’ ready for it,” said Winch. 

“It looks like it,” Texas admitted, more ashamed 
that a woman would stoop to such sharp practice 
than concerned over what now seemed the certain 
loss of the money that he had staked on Sallie 
McCoy. 

A cowboy who had been perched on the fence 
near by came hurrying over to where Texas stood, 
pegging along in halting short steps on his ridic¬ 
ulous high heels. He was full of protest against 
this imposition, and mad to the backbone. But 
before he could express himself in words an irrup¬ 
tion of cheers submerged him. Miss Goodnight 
had rounded her steer to the most conspicuous point 


CLOSE WORK 41 

of the arena, thrown her rope, brought him to the 
earth. 

There the steer lay stretched as pacifically as if 
he had arranged himself for his afternoon nap, legs 
extended, head on the ground, the slack barely 
taken out of the rope. No dust was raised by 
struggling legs to cut off the view of Miss Good¬ 
night’s operations with her hobble. The steer al¬ 
lowed her to bind him with no more resistance than 
a pet dog. 

There were cheers from a certain section of the 
grand stand where the young lady’s partizans ap¬ 
peared to be gathered in force, laughter breaking 
against the hoarse masculine shouting in rising 
waves. Texas and Winch stood with watches out, 
Sallie McCoy on her horse near them so indignant 
over this dishonest trick that she looked as if she 
would fight a sack of wildcats. 

Miss Goodnight stepped back from her con¬ 
quest of the steer; the vociferous section of the 
grand stand lifted a louder cheer, with waving hats. 
But there was a significant silence in other parts 
of the crowd, a questioning quietude. 

“You beat her anyhow—you beat her to a fare- 
you-well!” said Winch. 

“By seventeen seconds,” said Texas, looking up 
at her openly and boldly for the first time. 


42 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


“Wait a minute—the judges—” 

“Miss McCoy! I congratulate you! It was a 
magnificent victory, magnificently won!” 

The speaker was a minister, beyond any mis¬ 
take, short, round, half-bald, wholly jolly to see 
in%pite of his somber coat. He came up hat in 
one hand, the other reaching out toward Sallie Mc¬ 
Coy while still ten feet away, as if his heart went 
before him with the warm radiation of his sleek 
little body. 

“The judges—” Sallie began once more, doubt¬ 
fully. 

The judges were approaching the grand stand. 
The young man who had ridden his horse at Hart¬ 
well took the megaphone from the announcer, rode 
forward from the others a little way. 

“The judges—have the pleasure—of announc¬ 
ing—to you”—he spoke in a jerky, ringside deliv¬ 
ery that told at once of his apprenticeship, no mat¬ 
ter what his present trade—“the winner—of the 
ladies’—roping—contest. Miss Fannie Goodnight 
—wins the purse—and the honors—by two seconds 
—over—her nearest—competitor. I have the 
pleasure—of introducing—to you—Miss Fannie 
Goodnight—of Wichita—winner—of this event.” 

Cheers again from that conspicuous section of 
the grand stand. Miss Fannie Goodnight was on 
her horse, nodding her pretty head at her fervent 


CLOSE WORK 


43 


friends. Now they came pouring down into the 
arena, while other people who had put money on 
the local favorite, perhaps, or perhaps out of a spirit 
of fairness, stood protesting to each other, compar¬ 
ing Records, facing angrily toward the judges. In 
this part of the spectators were many cowboys. 
These now began to draw together and move down 
into the arena. 

At the announcement of the judges’ decision, 
Hartwell saw Sallie McCoy’s face grow white. He 
looked into the eyes of Winch and the cowboy, and 
saw there what they in turn read in his. As if 
given a command to march, they turned and bore 
down on the judges. 

Already these smiling tricksters were receiving 
the congratulations and thanks of the clique of 
gamesters with whom they had arranged the plot 
for a big clean-up. Led by Texas, the three 
champions of Sallie McCoy pushed through the 
crowd. Texas stood before the young man who 
had made the announcement and laid hold of his 
bridle. 

“I know it ain’t goin’ to do a bit of good to pro¬ 
test to this decision you’ve made—” 

“Then shut your fly trap!” the young man ad¬ 
vised. 

“But I want to express my sentiments to your 
faces,” Texas continued, holding back his wrath 


44 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


as a just man does the drawing of his weapon. 
“I’ve been among thieves on the highways and by¬ 
ways of the world before to-day, but I never run 
into a gang that was as low to the ground as you! ” 

The fellow jerked his reins to throw off Hart¬ 
well’s hand. 

“That’s about all you need to say, pardner!” he 
warned. 

“It does about cover the case,” said Winch. 

“You robbed that girl, and I want to tell you a 
set of crows that’d do a trick like that’d rob a 
church! ” 

Texas flung the bridle reins from him with dis¬ 
dain, making the horse shy and rear. The rider 
leaned toward him, his face black with rage. 

“A bunch of tin-horns like you—” 

Words were too weak for him; he cast them aside, 
spurred his horse forward in a sudden bound, 
plainly determined to ride his accuser down and 
trample him. 

The crowd fell back with sharp cries. Texas 
sprang to meet the plunging horse, caught it by the 
bit, held it while it reared and struck at him in the 
agony of its rowelled sides. The rider swung his 
quirt, bringing the heavy, leather-braided handle 
down on Hartwell’s head. 

Then followed, as quick as a man could sling a 
gun and fire, a thing such as no man in that crowd 


CLOSE WORK 


45 


ever had seen before. The lean cowman threw a 
hand to the distracted horse’s poll, while with the 
other he held the bit; forced the animal back to its 
haunches, its fore feet striking; twisted its neck and 
threw it, as neatly as if he had a rope on its leg. 

The rider flung himself from the saddle as the 
horse fell, and struck the ground with his gun in his 
hand. There was only the length of the horse be¬ 
tween them, and for a moment the bulk of the an¬ 
imal interposed as it struggled to its feet and gal¬ 
loped off. People cleared away from Hartwell 
like smoke before a wind, leaving him standing 
alone. 

In the old gun-slinging days on the Arkansas 
Valley range there was but one thing to do when 
you drew your weapon, and that was to shoot. A 
draw for a bluff, a moment’s hesitation—even the 
hairsbreadth shading of a moment—was a thing 
generally fatal to your future calculations. That 
was where the unhorsed judge fell into error. He 
stood for a heart-beat with the gun in his hand, as 
if he did not know the code. 

Texas covered the ground between them in a 
leap. The revolver went off as the humiliated 
judge fell before the stranger’s rush, adding to the 
confusion of the mixup that the dust and smoke 
made for a moment indistinct. When things 
cleared a little Texas had the gun. He threw it 


46 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


down and set his big foot on it, and met his op¬ 
ponent hand to hand as he scrambled from the 
ground. 

The danger over, the crowd closed around the 
struggling men again, with cries of derision and 
encouragement, curses, offers to bet on the outcome. 
Hartwell had hold of the quirt which the fellow 
had managed, somehow, to sling to his wrist by its 
stout leather thong. With a wrench he broke the 
leather and stepped back with the short rawhide 
whip in his hand. 

There was blood on the judge’s face, his hat was 
trampled under foot, his garments were covered 
with dust. He stood panting and winded, so 
heavily overmatched that he seemed to realize the 
uselessness of renewing the squabble, and to be 
waiting for some way to open that would let him 
out of it. 

Texas was pulling the slack up out of his sleeve, 
swinging his long arm like a man getting ready to 
put a shot. Before many had guessed his inten¬ 
tion he had the judge by the neck, and began whip¬ 
ping him as one might beat a vicious dog. 

Protests rose as the dust flew out of the fellow’s 
shirt, as he struggled and squirmed and struck wild 
blows, some of which fell on the man who chastised 
him, more of which missed. Men who would have 
held off in an unequal fight with a gun on one side 


CLOSE WORK 47 

and none on the other, pressed in and reached out 
to put an end to the castigation. 

That was the point, in the height of the confu¬ 
sion, the heat of the crowd’s partizanship, the face 
of the threat against the stranger, that Winch, the 
bow-legged man, came to the front. He pushed 
himself into the little space that Texas kept clear 
by his whirlwind operations, his coat open, his 
hands on his guns. His elbows stuck out at a 
sharp angle, suggestive of steel springs holding 
them ready to flash those guns before a man could 
half bat an eye. He leaned forward a little, a pe¬ 
culiar eagerness in his thin face, an electric bright¬ 
ness in his eyes. 

“Stand back, gentlemen, and let the law take its 
course!” said Winch, speaking very mildly, but in 
a voice that carried far even above the growl of the 
disgraced man’s friends who were running to his 
support. 

The crowd pressed back, the color dropping out 
of men’s faces, whispers running from lip to lip 
like the ripple of wind over water. Nobody ques¬ 
tioned the bow-legged man’s authority, nobody put 
hand to a gun to defend the issue. Texas released 
his grip on the man’s throat, gave him a parting 
blow in the face with his open hand, broke the whip 
and threw the pieces after him as he staggered 
away. 


48 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


“Here,” he called, picking up the gun, breaking 
it and ejecting the cartridges, “take this thing with 
you, you ornery houn’! ” 

In the confusion attending the fight the other two 
judges rode off and, it appeared also, the book¬ 
makers who had profited by their crooked award 
had vanished as well. A clamoring crowd of cow¬ 
boys and cattlemen was sweeping across the field 
looking for them, and others were hastily fetching 
their horses and loosening their ropes with unmis¬ 
takable signs of hostility. 

In the whirl of it Texas lost sight of Winch. Al¬ 
though he looked for him with the intention of 
thanking him for his timely support, the little bow- 
legged man could not be found. Turning to leave 
the field, he saw Sallie McCoy, who had ridden up 
near the place where he had lashed the dishonest 
judge with his own rawhide. There was something 
of gratitude and admiration in her face that thrilled 
him, and an elusive message in her clear brown 
eyes that warmed him to the marrow and made him 
proud. He touched his hat as he looked up into 
her face. 

She bent her head a little in acknowledgment of 
the salute. A rich flood of color rushed over her 
face, and Texas was not sure, but he believed that 
she smiled just a little as she wheeled her horse and 


CLOSE WORK 


49 


galloped away. It was as if she had waited there 
for that exchange of courtesies, as one who is in¬ 
capable of smallness in either thought or deed 
stands by to give a word to another of the same 
spirit whom he never may meet on the world’s long 
road again. It was an obligation of one brave 
spirit to another, and, being paid, there was no more 
to linger for. 

Texas watched her as she rode away, and was 
standing gazing like a man in a dream at the dust 
that hung after she had passed from his sight be¬ 
yond the corral gate, when Uncle Boley found him. 
The old man offered his hand, his blue eyes spark¬ 
ling with satisfaction. 

“You dusted that feller’s hide, and you dusted it 
right!” he said. “It was worth all that gang 
crooked out of me to see that, and I ain’t got no 
regrets, only that I roped you into it, Texas, and 
made you drop that roll you won.” 

“I’m richer a sight, sir, than I was two hours 
ago,” Texas said. “I’ve got fifty dollars left. It’s 
at your disposal, sir, to the last cent, if you can use 
it.” 

“You ain’t under no obligations to me that 
money-can pay, Texas.” 

“Thank you, sir; you’re most generous. I was 
.lookin’ around for that little man that squared in 


50 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


here and held that crowd off while I was larrupin’ 
that hide-bound houn’-dog. He seemed to get 
clean away. Do you know who he was?” 

“Yes, that was Dee Winch, one of the nicest lit¬ 
tle fellers in this town. But I wouldn’t thank Dee 
for what he done, if I was you. He’s like me, he 
don’t want anybody to thank him. When you meet 
him just shake hands with him and look him in the 
eyes and don’t say nothin’ at all. Dee he’ll un¬ 
derstand.” 

“Yes, sir. He seems to be a powerful nice little 
man.” 

“Dee is a nice little man, the nicest man, big or 
little, you’ll meet in many a day. Yes, sir, Dee 
he’s killed nineteen men around here in the past 
four years!” 


CHAPTER IV 


THE MANHUNTERS 

‘£^0 you and your pa put your money in 
real estate up there in Kansas City when you 
sold your ranch, and them sharks cleaned 
you out, eh?” 

“They scraped our bones, sir. But I paid out; 
I don’t owe any man, livin’ or dead, a cent—in any¬ 
thing that money will pay.” 

“No, I bet you don’t, Texas. Well, I’m glad 
you give me the inside and straight of your history, 
for I’m more’n a little petic’lar who I interduce to 
Sallie McCoy.” 

“I’m glad to hear you say it, grandpa.” 

“Don’t you ‘grandpa’ me, gol dern you! I ain’t 
no man’s grandpa! ” 

“No, sir, of course you’re not, sir.” 

“But I may be before I die. I ain’t so danged 
used up as some men of forty-seven I could name.” 
“Nor some of thirty-five, I bet you a purty, sir.” 
Well, I can hold up my end of the log along 
with most of ’em. They all call me Uncle Boley 
around here, but I ain’t nobody’s uncle, neither. 
I don’t mind that; I’ve known boys of ten that was 
si 


52 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


uncles. You can set in young bein’ a uncle, and 
keep it up as long as you live.” 

“Yes, sir; you sure enough can, sir.” 

They were back in Uncle Boley’s shop, and the 
old man was smoking his pipe, the day’s work be¬ 
ing done. Uncle Boley had insisted that Texas ac¬ 
cept the boots from him as an appreciation of the 
pleasure the afternoon’s adventures had given him. 
The old man said he didn’t think it was quite de¬ 
cent for a gentleman to go around in shoes, for a 
person couldn’t tell where his body ended and his 
legs began in that foot-gear. 

Texas had accepted the gift gratefully, and now 
he sat with his feet crossed, with something in his 
eyes that looked like pride to Uncle Boley, as he 
regarded the neat insteps and handsomely quilted 
tops. 

“Have you got a gun, Texas?” The old man 
turned a shrewd eye on him, his pipestem stayed 
two inches from his mouth. 

“No, sir, I haven’t got a gun right now.” 

The old man smoked a little while, a look of wise 
contemplation in his benevolent face. 

“Yes, I’d git one right away to-night if I was 
you. Mebbe two.” 

“Do you suppose I’ll have any urgent need for 
a gun, sir?” 

“Well, Texas, I wouldn’t be surprised if you did. 


53 


THE MANHUNTERS 

Do you know who that feller you larruped was?” 

“No, sir, I didn’t stop to inquire his name.” 

“He was Johnnie Mackey, mayor of this town, 
and owner of the biggest gamblin’ house and dance- 
house-saloon here.” 

Texas received the information with unmoved 
countenance. He sat staring out into the street, his 
legs stretched comfortably in his new boots, as if 
what he had heard was the lightest of incidental 
gossip. Uncle Boley watched him covertly, turn¬ 
ing his sly old eyes. He liked the way Texas took 
it; that was a mighty good sign of a man. 

“Well, sir, I reckon I had better buy me a gun,” 
Texas said at last, very softly. 

Uncle Boley nodded, and smoked on. It was 
past sunset, and with the cool of the day a fresh¬ 
ness had come that invigorated man and beast, and 
stiffened the drooping leaves of plantain and bur¬ 
dock like a shower. 

People were beginning to stir about in numbers 
surprising compared to the somnolence that had 
prevailed over Cottonwood when Texas arrived. 
Some went by with a look of drowsiness about them, 
as if they had just roused from sleep and were out 
foraging supper, and these Texas knew by their 
marks for gamblers and game-tenders, saloon em¬ 
ployees and the dusty butterflies wihch flitted under 
the dance-hall lamps. 


54 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


Cowboys were trooping in from long rides, others 
were setting out for their distant ranches. All was 
astir with a picturesque life that transformed the 
poor streets, and turned the plank “palaces” and 
“casinos” into places of romance and mystery. 

“Yes, sir, this was a purty decent town till about 
two weeks ago, a place where every man got a 
square deal and a show for his money, but it ain’t 
that way any more.” 

“What happened to change it, sir, if I may ask?” 

“Oh, we had a ’lection.” 

“Sure enough you did; I just bet you did!” 

“We put that feller—well, I didn’t have no hand 
in it—Mackey in for mayor, and a wall-eyed light- 
heel in for marshal, turned Dee Winch out to give 
him the job, and them two they’ve shut up every¬ 
thing in town they ain’t got a hand in or a rake- 
off on of some kind.” 

“You could expect it of Mackey, sir. He’s a 
houn’-dog from the rattlesnake hills by the look he 
wears in his face.” 

“It’s all cow trade in this place, for Cottonwood’s 
a cow town, and you know what it takes to draw 
cowboys and that kind. It takes noise and show 
and fiddlin’ and singin’. Up to a week ago we had 
two big dance halls, Jud Springer’s and Mackey’s. 
Both of ’em had bands fiddlin’ till the mayor up 
and ordered the aldermen to pass a law forbiddin’ 


THE MANHUNTERS 


55 


music in places where liquor was sold. The mar¬ 
shal he went right down and stopped Jud’s music, 
and the fiddlers and tooters all got a job playin’ 
for the mayor. Of course he wouldn’t put the law 
to his own place.” 

“So the business all went there, followin’ after 
the music, which is very natural,” Texas said. 

“Yes, mostly. But Jud he got three or four mu¬ 
sicians together and went ahead, and then the 
mayor sent a gang of gun-slingers down there and 
pitched everybody out and locked the door with a 
padlock and chain. They took Jud to the depot 
and told him to light out of here on the first train 
that stopped, and Jud he went. I don’t know what 
he’s goin’ to do about it, but I know he ain’t 
through. Jud ain’t that kind of a man.” 

“I would hope not, sir.” 

“So you see what kind of a feller Mackey is. 
You was kind of takin’ chances when you laid that 
rawhide to that scamp, but I glory in what you 
done. Yes, if I was in your place, Texas, I be¬ 
lieve I’d git me a couple of guns.” 

“Yes, sir, I don’t know but what I will, sir.” 

Uncle Boley went into the back room, which was 
his parlor, kitchen and bedroom all together, and 
came back with a revolver and belt. He sat with 
the belt over his knee, the big weapon in its chafed 
holster resting on the floor, saying nothing at all 


56 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


about it for a good many minutes. He seemed to 
be considering something, his hand on the leather 
in a touch like a caress. 

“Here’s a gun, Texas, that a friend of mine used 
to pack, the best man I ever knew, and the best 
friend I ever had. He died with it on him, and 
his widder give it to me. Just feel the weight of 
that gun, will you?” 

“It is a man’s gun, sir,” said Texas, drawing it 
from the holster with hand that told it was no 
stranger to such an operation. 

“That gun belonged to Ed McCoy, Sallie 
McCoy’s father. He died with it on him; the 
man that killed him never give him a show to 
use it.” 

“Miss Sallie is an orphan, then?” 

“Half orphant; her mother’s livin’. They’ve got 
the best house in Cottonwood, and the purtiest 
place, but that’s all they have got. Yes, sir, Sallie 
she needed the money them fellers beat her out of 
to-day; it’d ’a’ been like a rain in a drouth to them. 
I don’t suppose anything else but the need of it’d 
’a’ drove Sallie to go out there in public and take a 
hand in that ropin’. She’s a lady, that girl, is, 
from the heels up.” 

“It’s a scan’lous shame that she was beaten out 
of it! Do you suppose she’d accept—” 

“I s’pose she’d claw a mile of hide off of your 


THE MANHUNTERS 57 

skelp if you was to mention acceptin’ money to 
her!” 

“As payment for the use of her horse, sir,” Texas 
explained, his homely face burning from the old 
man’s vehement correction. 

“She’ll git on till school opens. She’s got a job 
for then, the first she ever was obliged to take. 
When Ed was alive they wallered in money, and 
they’d ’a’ had plenty to last ’em all their lives if 
they’d ’a’ got a square deal. They was beat out 
of a lot of money; I’ll tell you how it was. 

“Ed McCoy was the man that started this town. 
He was the first man that ever drove a herd of cat¬ 
tle up from Texas to load here, and he done it when 
other cowmen said it couldn’t be done and come out 
on it. He made a pile of money at it the first few 
years, but when them Texas cattle begun to spread 
the fever up here, and the cowmen on this range 
got to kickin’, Ed he quit drivin’ and started up 
the cattle business with a man name of Henry Stott, 
a kind of a half-breed Dutchman with eyes in his 
head like a hog. 

“Well, sir, a drouth hit us here about three years 
ago and nearly cleaned up this range, and McCoy 
and Stott they bought at their own price right and 
left. All the money Ed had went into stock. They 
must ’a’ had five or six thousand head that fall 
when the rains set in and the grass popped up. It 


58 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


looked like the biggest thing Ed ever had done, for 
he was the brains of it; Stott wasn’t nothing but the 
guts. 

“Well, sir, they found Ed McCoy dead out there 
on the prairie one day that fall, shot through the 
back of the head. Stott was away in Kansas City 
with a shipment, and it never has been found out 
who done that low-down job. Anyhow, to cut it off 
short, when it come to arrangin’ and settlin’ up 
what Ed left, by golly it come to pass he didn’t leave 
nothin’ but the house here in Cottonwood. No, sir, 
Henry Stott he brought out a note showin’ Ed owed 
him sixty thousand dollars, borrowed money. 

“All signed up by Ed, and all as straight as a 
die, the lawyers said. But the widder and Sallie 
they didn’t have no track of that money, didn’t know 
anything about the deal. What did Ed do with it 
if he got it? Gambled it off, some said. Well, I 
know better; Ed never set foot in a gamblin’ house 
as long as I knew him, and that was back in Me- 
zoury twenty years before I come out here.” 

“But the money was gone, sir?” 

“It was gone if it ever was paid in, son. I tell 
you, as I’ve told many a man face to face, and as 
I’ve told that hog-eyed Henry Stott face to face, it 
never was paid. That note was either a forgery, or 
else it was signed by Ed for something else and 


59 


THE MANHUNTERS 

filled in after he was dead. Sallie and her ma 
brought suit, but the court upheld Stott, and that 
ended it, I guess, till the judgment day. But Ed 
like to see Henry Stott’s face when he stands up be¬ 
fore the throne! My-y-y Lord, I’d like to see that 
dam’ Dutchman’s face!” 

“Is he still around here?” 

“Yes, he’s here, as big as a stuffed buzzard. 
He’s got a bank down on the corner of the square, 
and money to burn. But he don’t burn any of it, 
nor hand any of it out where it belongs, as fur as 
anybody ever saw. And this here’s pore old Ed’s 
gun. It never was drawed except in the right, and 
it never was put back in the leather without honor. 
It’d be a credit to any man to pack that gun.” 

“It sure would be, sir.” 

“Yes, and I’m keepin’ it by me chancin’ I may 
be called on to go out and use it one of these days. 
I’m the man of that family now, you might say, 
though I ain’t no kin. I can shoot, too, I can sling 
a gun as quick as any man of forty-seven you can 
name!” 

Texas was looking across the street at four men 
who had come lounging along the plank sidewalk 
throwing inquiring glances toward the little shop, 
talking among themselves in low voices. They 
were all too cautious and watchful for ordinary 


60 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


business or pleasure, something suppressed and 
alert about them which told Texas at once that they 
were looking for him. 

At the angle that he was looking through the 
door Uncle Boley could not see them. He started 
when Texas drew his feet back and sat up stiffly, 
seeming to grow several inches as his muscles set 
to meet the emergency of life or death which he 
knew he should soon be called upon to face. He 
believed the gang that had been sent out to hunt 
him had not seen him yet. He got up and stood 
aside a little from the open door. 

“What’s the matter?” Uncle Boley inquired, 
leaning to see. 

Texas motioned silently toward the street, his eyes 
on Ed McCoy’s gun with a flame in them such as 
burns from a man’s soul when he rises to the 
sublimest heights of courage. He felt that his hour 
had come, but he was ready. 

“It’s the mayor’s gang—they’re after you!” the 
old man said. 

Texas reached out for the revolver. Uncle Boley 
strapped the belt round the waist of his new-found 
friend, his hands trembling in the strain of the 
situation. 

“Go out the back door—I’ll hold ’em here till 
you’re gone!” he said. 

“You mean for me to run, sir?” 


THE MANHUNTERS 


61 


“Well no, Texas, I don’t mean for you to just 
run. But they’s four of them fellers, and ever’ 
one of ’em’s—” 

“If there were forty of them, sir, you couldn’t 
ask me to run!” 

The old man looked at him, a mist coming into 
his quick blue eyes. 

“No, I couldn’t even throw a hint, Texas.” 

Texas tightened the belt, snapped out the gun, 
changed the cartridges, working so fast that the 
old man gasped in admiration. He smiled, and 
held out his hand to Uncle Boley. 

“I wish to thank you for your many kindnesses 
to me, a stranger in your door, sir,” he said. His 
voice was as light and steady, his eyes as eager, as 
if he was about to mount his horse and ride away 
on some pleasant adventure. 

Uncle Boley pressed the young stranger’s hand— 
a stranger grown suddenly as dear to him as a son 
returned from his far wanderings—and Texas 
turned with quick step and passed out into the 
street. 


CHAPTER V 


FOUR TO ONE 

T HERE were certain precautions to be ob¬ 
served in Cottonwood in killing a man, for 
no matter how worthless or obscure a man 
might be in that town, nobody knew what powerful 
friends or relatives might be uncovered elsewhere 
by his sudden death. Friends, relatives, money in 
the family, political influence, sometimes meant the 
utmost penalty of the law for his slayer. So it was 
a matter of common prudence to have the plea of 
self-defense to stand on, with witnesses to maintain 
it. 

For that reason alone the four gun-slingers did 
not pull out weapons and kill Hartwell the moment 
that he stepped into the street. A quarrel had to 
be provoked first, and the victim badgered into put¬ 
ting his hand toward his gun, or making a start 
as if he intended to do it. Some shadow of justifi¬ 
cation must be contrived. Many a man had been 
killed on the cattle-ranges for starting to take his 
handkerchief out of his pocket. That was the be¬ 
ginning of the cowboy fashion of wearing that ar¬ 
ticle around the neck. 


62 


FOUR TO ONE 


63 


Texas stood a moment framed in the open door, 
in the manner of a man undecided which way he 
will turn when he has no definite business ahead of 
him. The four men across the street scattered out 
of the close formation that they had maintained as 
they came along, as if they expected hostilities to 
open immediately. Texas did not betray any evi¬ 
dence that he was even aware of their existence, 
much less their presence not more than sixty feet 
distant, where they stood convicted of their inten¬ 
tion by their flighty start. 

There was a telegraph-pole in the edge of the 
sidewalk a little way along the street from Uncle 
Boley’s door, the planks trimmed to fit round it. 
Texas sauntered along to it with the deliberate air 
of a man who had the night ahead of him, leaned 
his back against it, and began to roll a cigarette. 
Two of the mayor’s committee started across the 
street, the other two shifting down to a stand diag¬ 
onally across from the spot where Texas stood. 

Texas ran his eye over them, and kept it on 
them sharply, for all that he seemed engrossed in 
the task of contriving his cigarette. They had the 
appearance of men such as stood lookout over faro 
games, and worked as bouncers in the rough resorts 
common to that country and time. Three of them 
wore white shirts and the little narrow-brimmed 
derby hats which were popular among the frontier 


64 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


gamblers of that day. The other was a composi¬ 
tion of cowboy and sport. Texas recalled having 
seen him at the show. 

The pair approaching Texas crossed over to the 
sidewalk a little way below him, where they stood 
waiting for their companions to join them. These 
latter came over in the cautious manner of men 
stalking game, walking two yards apart, one a little 
in advance of the other, watching Texas for the 
first movement of hostile demonstration. 

People in shop doors and on the street knew at 
once what these preparations portended. Many 
battles had been fought out in the open on that 
ground, frequently with more damage to those not 
engaged than to the principals. It had come to the 
point where nobody took chances, and with this 
gathering of the battle-cloud before their doors the 
storekeepers retreated to the backs of their shops, 
and put something solid between them and the 
street; pedestrians dodged behind buildings and 
into the shelter of open doors. In an emergency 
like that a sod house was the most popular struc¬ 
ture within reach. 

One of the men came up within three yards of 
Texas, watching him at every step as closely as he 
would have watched a trapped bear. 

“Sport, there’ll be a train along here in twenty 
minutes, and you’re goin’ to take it,” he announced. 


FOUR TO ONE 


65 


Texas glanced up from the contemplation of 
a match that had failed to ignite against the 
telegraph-pole, with a look in his face as if he had 
been philosophizing on its weakness, and drawing 
comparisons between it and the failure of a friend 
in the hour of necessity. 

“Were you addressin’ me, sir?” he asked. 

“I was addressin’ you, pardner. You take to 
the middle of the road and trot ahead of us, and 
you make a start right now!” 

Texas tried the match again, looked at the head 
of it with a little cloud as of sorrow and disappoint¬ 
ment in his face, as if the undoubted discovery of 
its unworthiness had hurt him deeply. He stood 
a moment, the unlit cigarette in his lips, his head 
bent a trifle, as if thinking more of the match than 
the man. 

“I’m sorry,” he said, “but I’m not ready to leave 
this evenin’.” 

Indifferent, unmoved, as he seemed, Texas was 
set like a hair-trigger, watching every man of them, 
the match in his fingers, his hand just a few inches 
above the butt of his gun. 

Heads were put cautiously around corners of 
buildings and out of doors to investigate this delay 
and silence in the street. The spokesman of the 
gunners’ committee came half a step nearer. 

It was not meant that Texas should take the 


66 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


train out of Cottonwood that evening, or ever again. 
The command to take the road and trot ahead of 
them had been given with the accent of insult to 
make it gall deeper, in the belief that it would be 
resented by the man of spirit whom they knew 
Texas to be. His failure to fly up all afire as they 
had expected, and give them what they would call 
a justification for their deed was a circumstance 
upon which they had not counted. 

Inside his little shop Uncle Boley felt the strain 
of waiting. He hoped that Texas had not changed 
his mind after coming in sight of them and given 
them the dodge; he hoped it sincerely, for the honor 
of the gun that he wore. Unable to stand the un¬ 
certainty of the situation any longer, he went to 
the door and stood there boldly, his long beard like 
a white apron down his vest. 

‘Tm sorry to refuse,” said Texas, and with that 
word flipped the unburned match from his fingers. 

At that little movement the man in front of Texas 
threw his hand to his weapon. Uncle Boley al¬ 
ways said that he lost track of things from that 
point. But he was certain that the man who started 
to draw his gun never got any farther with it than 
just clear enough of the holster to let it fall when 
Texas nipped him through the wrist-bone. 

There was a good deal of smoke and a lot of 
noise around the telegraph-pole where Texas stood 


FOUR TO ONE 


67 


with his back to it, and Uncle Boley was so excited 
that he found himself out on the sidewalk, right in 
the middle of things, when he got hold of the swift¬ 
running events again. 

The man who had started to sling down on Texas 
was holding his crippled arm, making no effort to 
pick up his gun with his whole hand. The other 
three were not in sight, but some shots came from 
the corner of a building fifty yards down the street, 
doing no damage. 

Texas was loading his gun, his cigarette in his 
lips, quite calm and undisturbed. There were two 
little hard hats on the sidewalk where the three men 
had stood, a hole in each of them that Uncle Boley 
said he could have shoved his fist through. 

The crowd came filling into the street as silently 
as water, not a word in any man’s mouth. The 
shot hats were picked up, the press swallowed the 
man with the shattered wrist, and people with white 
faces and big, wondering eyes stood off a little way 
in a ring around Texas, with a strained, fearful 
respect in their attitude, as if ready to burst away 
and run at his slightest movement. 

Uncle Boley pushed his way through to Texas. 
The young man had put his pistol in the holster, 
and was standing with his head bent a little, in his 
thoughtful, contemplative pose, as if bowed with 
regret for the necessity of the swift adjustment 


68 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


he had made in that unfair attempt to take his life. 
Uncle Boley said afterward that he knew Texas was 
not hit, because he didn’t stand on his legs like a 
man with a bullet in him. Uncle Boley had seen 
too many of them in that fix to make a mistake. 

“You got ’em, ever’ dern one of ’em!” Uncle 
Boley said, his old eyes lively with the pride that 
seemed to lift him and make him young again. 

“No, sir, I got mostly hats,” Texas replied, his 
eye-warming smile kindling a glimmer for a mo¬ 
ment on his lips. 

“Yes, and that crowd’ll know who to monkey 
with next time, I bet you a button!” the old man 
said, turning to the people round him, giving it off 
with impressive authority. “Come on in, Texas, 
gol dern ’em!” 

It was a high and mighty moment for Uncle Boley 
when he opened the crowd on the sidewalk to his 
little shop door, Texas coming along behind, a 
hand on the old man’s shoulder with something in 
the touch of unbounded gentleness and affection. 

A commotion in the crowd caused them to stop 
at the door and look back. Texas’s right hand hov¬ 
ered over his revolver in that ready, watchful poise 
that he had held when he stood with his back to 
the telegraph-pole, the match in his fingers. 

But the gun-slingers were not rallying to battle 
again. It was the mayor and the city marshal. 


FOUR TO ONE 


69 


The mayor stopped near the pole, where there was 
a wide blot of blood on the boards of the sidewalk, 
a trail running off from it marking the way the 
crippled man had gone. 

“They didn’t get him!” said the mayor with a 
curse. 

“He’s over there,” said somebody. The mayor 
looked and saw Texas waiting with his old whis¬ 
kered friend for the outcome of the mayor’s mis¬ 
carried plot. 

“Arrest that man!” the mayor ordered, giving it 
as a general command to the public. 

“You let that kid alone, Johnnie,” said a soft, 
calm voice behind Texas. 

Texas looked to see who had lifted a word for 
him in that place, where every face expressed 
either hate of him or fear. It was the lady in the 
green velvet dress, her little silver trinkets and or¬ 
naments white against the rich cloth in the blur that 
was coming into the passing day. Texas put his 
hand to his hat in grateful acknowledgment. She 
smiled as the wind moved the long hair on his 
temples. 

“I saw it all,” she said, speaking to the mayor 
with a cold, commanding directness. “You let that 
kid alone!” 

A sneer jerked the mayor’s face, which grew paler 
at her word. He was a slender man of medium 


70 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


height, with a clerkly fairness of skin, fair hair cut 
close to his small head, small ears pressed tight 
against his skull. But a man with something be¬ 
hind the mask of his commonplace face, something 
ungrasped at the first look, which grew elusive as 
one studied it and groped to define it; a something 
that left a sense of disquietude in the mind, a feel¬ 
ing that this man would come again into the busi¬ 
ness or the tragedy of one’s days, and for no good 
purpose ever. 

He turned his back to her with a quick, uplifting 
shake of the head, as of defiance, or threat of fu¬ 
ture adjustment, pushed into the crowd and disap¬ 
peared. With another smile, and a direct look into 
his eyes that brought the blood to Hartwell’s lean 
cheeks, the velvet lady followed after the mayor. 
Uncle Boley touched his young friend’s arm; they 
went in and shut the door. 

“You showed them light-heels!” Uncle Boley ex¬ 
ulted. “Yes, and I’ll bet four bits Johnnie Mackey 
will have to do some tall lookin’ around before he 
can hire another crowd to tackle that job, by 
granger! ” 

“It was uncommonly generous for that young 
lady to speak up for me,” said Texas reflectively, 
still in that mood of thoughtful depression that 
seemed to have settled over him like a cloud. 


FOUR TO ONE 


71 


“I don’t know who that Fannie Goodnight is, 
but she’s got a rope on Johnnie Mackey’s leg. Yes, 
and I’ll bet four bits she can flop him quicker’n 
she did that shadder of a steer any time she wants 
to. That white-eyed son-of-a-gun’s a-scairt of her; 
he wilted like a frosted turnip when she dressed him 
down.” 

“He did seem to act like he’d taken orders from 
her before. Well, sir, do you reckon I’ll be taken 
up for what I had to do?” 

“They can’t take a man up in Cottonwood for 
defendin’ his life,” said Uncle Boley, a sort of tri¬ 
umphant pride in the immunities of his town. 
“The thing’s settled as fur as any lawin’s goin’ to 
come in. I reckon a hundred people could be 
called up that saw them fellers crowd that fight on 
you.” 

“I hope they could,” sighed Texas. 

“I was standin’ right there in that door when 
that feller made that pass to sling his gun down on 
you.” 

Uncle Boley chuckled at the recollection. 

“You moved so dang swift I couldn’t tell how 
you done it, but I can swear till the cows come 
home that he made the first break toward a gun.” 

“I’m glad to hear you say it, sir. That young 
lady remarked that she saw it, too. Two reliable 


72 THE TRAIL RIDER 

witnesses ought to get a man off from a little fuss 
like that.” 

Texas unbelted the gun and offered it to the old 
man. 

“That’s a good and a true gun, sir. It came up 
to what was expected of it, like a friend a man can 
depend on.” 

“Keep it; buckle it on you and wear it, son. I’ve 
been waitin’ for a man to come along that was big 
enough to stand up under Ed McCoy’s gun. It’s 
yours now.” 

A flush of pride came over the good, homely face 
of the young man as he drew the big gun from the 
holster and laid its long barrel in his palm. He 
stood looking at it with such a tenderness in his 
eyes as might have gladdened a woman’s heart. 

“I hope I’ll never be called on to sling this gun 
down on any man again,” he said, his voice earnest 
and low, “and I never will draw it except to defend 
my life or what belongs to me, or the life or prop¬ 
erty of somebody not able to fight for himself.” 

It was as if he pronounced the words of a vow, 
or the spirit of Ed McCoy had come to confront 
him, demanding a pledge of his worthiness. 

“And I’m a goin’ to turn my face around, sir, 
and see if there isn’t some justice to be had for 
those left behind by the man that used to wear this 


FOUR TO ONE 


73 


gun. If the day ever comes that I have to draw it 
in that cause. I’ll use it till I drop with it in my 
hand, so help me God!” 

“Amen!” said Uncle Boley, his head bowed as 
if he had listened to a prayer. 


CHAPTER VI 


THE WANDERER'S RETURN 

UTSIDE Uncle Boley’s window the crowd 



had thinned away; traffic was running in 


the street again as if tragedy had not stood 


there a little while before and paralyzed its stream. 
From the heart of the town, two squares away, the 
sound of music came through the twilight. 

“I can take you around and interduce you to 
Sallie and her mother now,” Uncle Boley said. “I 
tell you, Texas, a feller purty near has to come with 
his papers in his hand before I'll do that much for 


“I’ll warrant you he does, sir, and I’m mighty 
proud to have you trust me as worthy of the honor. 
But I don’t feel like I ought to go fresh from a 
qua’l and a brawl into that little lady’s presence, 
sir, and take her by the hand.” 

“She’ll be glad to see you, and she’ll be keen to 
understand. You done it for her, Texas. If you 
never had ’a’ stood up for her rights to-day this 
thing never would ’a’ happened.” 

“To-day!” said Texas musingly, reviewing the 
events which had filled his few hours in Cotton- 


74 


THE WANDERER’S RETURN 


75 


wood. “Yes, it was to-day, wasn’t it? Sir, it 
seems to me like I have been here a hundred 
years! ” 

“I want you to wear Ed’s gun when you meet ’em. 
That’s the biggest recommend I can give you—that 
I thought you fit to pack that gun.” 

“I’ll have to get me a coat, sir, and some other 
things. I’m not presentable to ladies to-night. I 
beg you, sir, to put it off another day.” 

“Well, we can’t go to-morrow night, ’cause there’s 
an icercream festibul at the Methodist church, and 
Sallie and her ma they’re head and heels into it. 
But I tell you what we can do: we can go to the 
festibul.” 

“I’ll get trimmed up a little for it.” 

“Trimmed up?” Uncle Boley looked him over 
with questioning stare. “I don’t see what more a 
man needs when he’s got a good pair of boots and 
his hair combed.” 

“Customs differ in different places, sir. To¬ 
morrow I’ll have to see if I can find something to 
do, Uncle Boley. I can’t afford to be idle many 
days.” 

Uncle Boley sat thoughtfully silent a while, 
gathering his beard in his hands like a sheaf of 
grain. 

“The association wants to hire two or three trail- 
riders, I hear,” he said at last. 


76 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


“Trail-riders? You don’t mean men to carry 
mail, sir?” 

“No, I mean trail-riders, just plain trail-riders.” 

“I don’t believe we had ’em in Taixas, sir.” 

“No, I guess you didn’t. Trail-ridin’ is a new 
profession—it sprung up in this country in the 
last two years, since the cattlemen all went into the 
association to keep the Texas fever out of the Ar¬ 
kansas Valley range. Well, you bein’ from Texas, 
maybe they wouldn’t give you a job.” 

“Has it got something to do with keeping Taixas 
cattle out of this part of the country, sir?” 

“It’s got all to do with it. You know them 
Texas herds drops fever ticks around here some¬ 
times as thick as beans, and the association’s been 
trvin’ to git Congress to pass a law settin’ a quar¬ 
antine line ag’in ’em. Congress ain’t took no ac¬ 
tion on it, but the association’s set certain trails for 
them Texas cattle to foiler when they drive ’em up 
to this country to ship, and the trail-riders is the 
fellers that sees they take to ’em and keep to ’em.” 

“I understand it, sir.” 

“You can’t blame the cattlemen on this range 
if they have laid out trails that takes Texas cattle 
to hell-and-gone around and nearly wears ’em out 
before they git to where they’re goin’. Texas 
fever’s cost ’em millions on this range in the past 
five or six years, and it’s either go out of business, 



THE WANDERER’S RETURN 77 

or turn the range over to the Texas cowmen, or shut 
’em out. Well, the association figgers they’ll make 
more money by shuttin’ ’em out.” 

Uncle Boley chuckled. He had many recollec¬ 
tions of the clashes which had come between Texas 
and Kansas cattlemen over the quarantine trails. 

“What do the trail-riders do, sir, if the Taixas 
cowmen refuse to keep to the trails set for them 
to drive over?” 

“They pass the word back to headquarters down 
on Malcolm Duncan’s ranch, and men enough’s 
sent down to turn ’em, by granger! They have 
some purty sharp argyments sometimes.” 

“A man would need a good horse for that job,” 
Texas reflected. 

“Yes, he would, or for most any job, but some 
of them triflin’ things I asked you about and you 
said you couldn’t do. But I guess that could be 
fixed up, all right. If Malcolm Duncan gives you 
a job he’ll trust you for a horse. They pay them 
riders eighty dollars a month and found. A man 
could mighty soon buy a horse out of that.” 

So they decided, after talking it over fully, that 
trail-riding offered the best opening for a man of 
Texas Hartwell’s limited business experience in 
that country. In the morning Texas was to put in 
his application with Duncan, president of the Cat¬ 
tle Raisers’ Association. In the meantime, for a 


78 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


good clean bed and a welcome like home, Uncle 
Boley recommended the Woodbine Hotel, kept by 
Malvina Smith and her mother, Mrs. Goodloe. 

“Ollie Noggle, our head-leadin’ barber, and sev¬ 
eral more of our professional men boards there reg¬ 
ular, and I take my meals there myself on Sun¬ 
days,” he explained. “It ain’t so much of a hotel 
to look at on the outside, for I don’t like the green 
Malvina had it painted after she got her divorce 
bill from Zebedee.” 

“Green’s for hope, they say, sir,” said Texas, 
with that queer half-smile of his. 

“Yes,” said Uncle Boley, wondering what it 
would take to make him laugh, “and I guess she’s 
goin’ to git her hopes fulfilled, all right. Ollie 
Noggle seems to be leadin’ peaceful and quiet. I 
guess she’ll land him before the summer’s through. 
The old lady she’ll kind of show off to you a 
day or two, proud as all git-out over that divorce 
paper Malvina’s got. It’s the first one anybody in 
Cottonwood ever got through a court, and that old 
lady she shows it off like it was a deed to a ranch.” 

“It’s a queer kind of thing to have a family pride 
in.” 

“Yes, I never had much use for divorce bills my¬ 
self, but it’s a curiosity to some folks. The neigh¬ 
bors is as much to blame as the old lady, and more. 
They used to go there in droves at first to see it, 


THE WANDERER’S RETURN 


79 


and set around and gab about every other thing 
in the lands below the firmament. But all the time 
they was eatchin’ to see that dang fool paper, and 
the old lady was as tickled as if she was takin’ 
snuff.” 

“You don’t tell me!” 

“Yes, and she’d let ’em eatch and squirm till she 
got ’em worked up so they felt like they was settin’ 
over steam, then she’d grin her old yeller teeth as 
big as a horse’s, and say: ‘Show ’em your divorce 
paper, Malvina.’ ” 

“That sure was a divertin’ kind of a game.” 

“Yes, and she’ll try to work your curiosity up to 
the blisterin’ heat that way, too. Well, when she’d 
say that, Malvina she’d blush and simmer, and git 
up and go to the press and take that old fool paper 
out from between the ironed sheets where she kep’ 
it from wrinklin’, and hand it around like it was 
the Declaration of Independence, with John Han¬ 
cock’s name on it you could read forty feet. Huh! 
derned old fool thing for a passel of women to 
glommer over, wasn’t it?” 

“I expect it was because every married lady may 
have a secret longing to own a document of the 
same kind herself some day, sir.” 

“Oh, you git out! I’ve knowed women you 
couldn’t separate from their old men with a maul 
and wedge.” 


80 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


“They are exceptions, I have no doubt, sir.” 

“Yes, a notion like that ortn’t keep a man from 
marryin’. He ort to marry young, and stay mar¬ 
ried, even if he has to do it over a couple of times.” 

“I’m not skeptical on the subject of marriage, or 
of the fidelity of the ladies, sir. I was merely 
remarkin’. What became of Zebedee, or what did 
he do to occasion the divorce?” 

“Zebedee he went down to the Nation about three 
years ago to look around. He never come back, 
and he never wrote. Malvina got tired of de¬ 
pendin’ on him to let her hear whe’er he was livin’ 
or dead or married to a squaw, and she got her bill. 
Can’t blame Malvina, she always had to make the 
livin’ anyhow, and she’s a real purty little chunk of 
a woman, but I never did agree that her red hair 
matched that green paint on the hotel.” 

So, with the history of Malvina Smith like an 
open book in his hand, Texas left Uncle Boley for 
the night. His first thought was to seek a store 
and buy himself a coat, for he was reluctant to ap¬ 
pear before even the red-haired holder of the only 
divorce paper in Cottonwood in his shirt-sleeves. 
Shirt-sleeves were well enough for business hours, 
but out of business hours a gentleman ought to 
have a coat. That was the opinion of Texas, and 
all the usages in the world to the contrary could not 
have bent him from it an inch. 


THE WANDERER’S RETURN 


81 


Texas walked warily through the main street of 
Cottonwood, where gasoline-lamps on posts made 
a very good illumination, together with the bright¬ 
ness that radiated from the windows. He kept his 
hand hovering over his gun, and turned his head 
this way and that, like a man in the enemy’s coun¬ 
try where he believes every hand hostile. 

He knew himself to be a man marked for de¬ 
struction. That sentence he had read in the 
mayor’s exclamation of angry disappointment when 
he found that Hartwell had not been slain, and the 
look of his eyes the moment that he turned and hid 
himself in the throng. There would be strain and 
disquietude, high tension and uncertainty, every 
hour that he remained in Cottonwood. He con¬ 
sidered whether it would not be the best and wisest 
thing, for his own safety and peace, to leave the 
town at once. 

Then there came flashing back to him the pic¬ 
ture of Sallie McCoy as she sat there in her saddle 
when he stood alone after thrashing the mayor. 
The warm feeling of pride that had stirred in him 
then like a heroic resolution expanded over his 
body again. He felt that the unspoken message 
that had passed from eye to eye between them in 
that moment had been a pledge of some undreamed, 
embryonic thing of the future, still nebulous and 
misty, still not understood. But of something rest- 


82 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


ful to the buffeted soul and weary body, like the 
“shadow of a rock in a desert land.” 

His feet felt planted in that town; it was indeed 
as if he had been there many years, and had be¬ 
come a figure in the place. He could not go; he 
could not turn away, at least not so far that he 
could not ride back in a day or two, like the cow¬ 
boys from the range around. He felt that he had 
been directed to Cottonwood, and into the adven¬ 
tures of this day, to become the instrument of a 
good and noble purpose. 

That girl’s father had carried this weapon that 
pressed against his thigh in the assurance of de¬ 
fense, like the hand of a trusted friend in the dark. 
Surely it was not merely the chance of a day that 
had put the weapon in his keeping; surely the 
words which he had spoken when the old man gave 
him the title of ownership to it had not sprung out 
of an empty heart or boastful mind. Time had 
shaped him to a purpose in that land; circum¬ 
stances had placed in his hand the key to unlock 
mysteries, the power to adjust wrongs. The events 
of that day had been written into his life’s program 
a long time in advance. 

Texas appeared at the Woodbine Hotel a little 
while after the soft summer darkness had engulfed 
Cottonwood, its crudities and its sins, wearing a 
black coat which gave him a very professional ap- 


THE WANDERER’S RETURN 


83 


pearance above the middle thigh. This coat he 
had found in a store called the Racket, kept by a 
Jew who wore spectacles with thick lenses, and 
was a very worm of a man in his apparent humility. 

The length of this garment—it was of the style 
called Prince Albert, much favored even to this day 
in Missouri and Arkansas by country barristers 
and barbers and negro preachers—seemed to in¬ 
crease Hartwell’s height by several inches, and gave 
him a dignified and decent appearance, indeed. It 
had the added advantage of a screen for his re¬ 
volver, thus taking away from him the appearance 
of challenge that his armament seemed to inspire. 
Texas was pleased with it, the fit of it in the shoul¬ 
ders, the comfortable feeling of being dressed that 
it gave him, in spite of the great sweat that it threw 
him into, for it was a still, warm night. 

There was nobody in the office of the Woodbine 
Hotel, but through the open door leading to the 
dining-room Texas could see a party gathered at 
supper around a long table. § The cackle and chat¬ 
ter proclaimed a celebration of some kind, which 
he was reluctant to interrupt. As he waited for 
somebody to appear and inquire into his wants, he 
saw a small bell on the show-case, such as teachers 
once used to call up classes, and pasted inside the 
glass a card with “Wring” written in ink as weak 
and inassertive as an old person’s voice. 


84 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


Mrs. Goodloe answered the bell. There was no 
mistaking her after Uncle Boley’s mention of her 
teeth. Texas never had seen teeth to compare with 
those in any human mouth. They were as broad 
as thumb-nails, yellow as old teacups, and a short¬ 
age in the goods of which her upper lip had been 
cut had left their owner without means of conceal¬ 
ing them save by an effort which brought on a spas¬ 
modic convulsion of the face, alarming and dis¬ 
tressing to behold. 

This operation Mrs. Goodloe seemed to consider 
a necessary preliminary to speech. It could be ef¬ 
fected only by pulling down the short upper lip, 
and that tension in turn tightened the skin on her 
large nose and drew it down from her eyes, giving 
Mrs. Goodloe a most startled and astonished look. 

She stood in the door, her face arranged in this 
manner, saying nothing, but looking Texas over as 
if in doubt whether he was cura or cowboy. Her 
face was red, and sweat glistened on it, as if she 
had put down some violent task to answer his sum¬ 
mons. He inquired about accommodations, men¬ 
tioning Uncle Boley. 

At the mention of Uncle Boley Mrs. Goodloe 
smiled. It came on her so suddenly, and was so 
vast in extent, that she looked as if she had rip¬ 
ened and burst, like a touch-me-not, and was about 
to sow a crop of teeth. 


THE WANDERER’S RETURN 


85 


“Yes, we can put you up, but I’ll have to ask 
you to wait a little while before I can fix you up a 
room. My daughter’s just been married, and we’re 
givin’ an infare supper.” 

“There’s no hurry at all, ma’am; don’t interrupt 
the festivities on my account. I’ll just sit out here 
and read the paper, if you don’t mind?” 

She bustled about a bit, pleased with his appear¬ 
ance and the sound of his voice, so gentle and soft 
compared to the high, loud key of the usual cow¬ 
boy, and got him a later paper than the one on the 
counter. 

“We get the Kansas City papers the next day 
after they’re printed now,” she told him, with pride 
in the metropolitan stamp that it gave Cottonwood; 
“they come through in a hurry since they put on 
the cannon-ball.” 

She hurried back to the feast. Texas arranged 
himself to read the paper, the clash of cutlery on 
dish, the mingled voices in loud hilarity, attesting 
to the enjoyment that was under way within. 

From where he sat he could see the head of the 
table, the bride and groom facing him, Malvina 
unmistakable on account of her red hair. At the 
corner of the table on the bride’s other hand was 
the little round minister whom Texas had seen at 
the fair. 

There were ten or a dozen other guests, and they 


86 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


were eating boiled ham and mashed potatoes, and 
fried chicken heaped in a great brown mountain on 
a tremendous dish. This dish Mrs. Goodloe was 
carrying up the line. As she passed from guest to 
guest Texas could hear her say, in unvarying 
formula, with unvarying accent of generous invita¬ 
tion and urging, her voice as plain as if she stood 
behind his chair: 

“Won’t you have some of this here fried chicken? 
Won’t you have some of this here fried chicken ?” 

She had almost reached the groom, known to 
Texas at the first glance as the head-leadin’ barber 
whom Uncle Boley had mentioned, by his big black 
mustache, his narrow face and oiled hair; Mrs. 
Goodloe was even approaching him, when there 
came in from the street a man whose demeanor and 
appearance at once drew the attention of Texas 
from the wedding banquet. 

This was a bristling, big, bony man, sour-faced, 
red-eyed. His shirt was as red as the grates of 
inferno, and his mustache was red under his long, 
ill-favored nose. He had the appearance of one 
who had come in from a long journey, and there 
was a sullenness in his small eyes as if he sat up 
nights to nurse a grudge. He wore a white silk 
handkerchief around his neck; on his boots Mexi¬ 
can spurs with rowels as big as silver dollars. 

“Ain’t nobody tendin’ to business in this joint?’ , 


THE WANDERER’S RETURN 87 

he inquired, his voice rough in that hoarseness that 
much raw liquor puts into a man naturally pitched 
in a low key. 

“They’re inside there havin’ an infare party. If 
you’ll hit that bell—” 

“Whose infare party?” 

The man turned to Texas with such ferocity that 
it gave him the appearance of being the traveling 
opponent of infare parties, a sort of walking dele¬ 
gate for the suppression of infare parties, and the 
elimination of such light frivolity from the somber 
business of life. 

“Not mine, sir,” said Texas, resenting the man’s 
front, and his air of accusation and blame. 

“Whose in the hell, then?” 

“Smith was her name. She’s the lady that runs 
the ranch.” 

The stranger stepped back from the counter and 
looked into the dining-room. Mrs. Goodloe had 
reached the groom with the platter of fried chicken, 
to which he was helping himself with great elegance 
and liberality, spearing deep into the pieces with 
his fork, pushing them free from the tines with 
his handy thumb. 

There the stranger stood a little while, harsh of 
outline, the dust of long roads on his red shirt, a 
big gun dangling at his side. 

Mrs. Goodloe had assisted the bride to the deli- 


88 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


cacy, which she bore high on her shoulder like a 
hod, when the man walked into the dining-room, 
his spurs clicking on the floor, his hat-brim pushed 
up flat against the crown as if a strong wind struck 
him in the face. 

And by the hush that fell, like the silence of a 
broken fiddle-string, Texas Hartwell knew that the 
stranger was Zebedee Smith, the man who had gone 
to the Nation to look around. 


CHAPTER VII 


THE LISTENING MAN 

T EXAS put down the paper and went over 
to the door to see how the situation was go¬ 
ing to untangle. It was a complication 
such as he never had heard of, and was curious to 
know what view Zebedee Smith was going to ex¬ 
press. Texas did not believe that Mr. Ollie Nog- 
gle would rise to any remarkable height in the dis¬ 
cussion, basing his judgment entirely on the bar¬ 
ber’s loud and frequent laughter. 

There was no laughter in the groom’s face now 
as Mrs. Goodloe put down the dish of chicken with 
an exclamation that sounded like somebody taking 
the lid off a hot kettle. His face was white, and 
he had hold of the table as if to keep himself from 
falling under it. Malvina’s eyes were big, as if she 
strained them to convince herself that it was the 
flesh and bone of Zeb Smith that confronted her, 
and not his dusty spirit from some dusty realm 
beyond this world. 

“Why, Zeb Smith!” said the minister, rising 
from his chair. “Where in this world did you 
come from?” 


89 


90 


THE TRAIL RIDER 

Zeb had stopped a few feet from the end of the 
table, where he stood looking fiercely at Malvina. 

“Couldn’t even marry a man!” he said. 

His voice was as hoarse as the hot winds, some¬ 
thing in it so suggestive of scorching vitals and 
burning passages that one felt impelled to offer him 
water. 

Mrs. Goodloe recovered herself quickly, resent¬ 
ment of this intrusion clearing her mind of surprise. 
She went around the table and confronted Zeb, her 
arms bare to the elbows, the recollection of old in¬ 
dignities hot in her face. 

“You git out of here, Zeb Smith!” she com¬ 
manded. “You don’t own a stick in this place and 
you ain’t got no right to set your foot in it! You 
never was no good and you never will be, you 
sneakin’ old devil!” 

“I’ll show you who’s got a right and who ain’t!” 
Zeb threatened. “A man’s home’s where his wife 
lives. That’s the law. And here I come home 
and find my wife settin’ at the side of a feller she 
thinks she’s married to, eatin’ a infare supper with 
a passel of people that’s aigged her on into bigamy. 
I’ll make you smoke—I’ll make ever’one of you 
smoke! ” 

The barber had slipped down in his chair until 
he sat on the middle of his spine. He appeared 
to have shrunk in upon himself to about half his 


THE LISTENING MAN 


91 


original size, and he was clinging desperately to the 
table to keep his head above the water of complete 
disgrace. 

Malvina looked at the preacher, a pathetic appeal 
in her eyes, and the preacher turned to Smith. 

“Why, Smith, she’s divorced from you, regu¬ 
larly divorced,” he said. “The requirements of 
the law have been met with; you have no claim on 
her whatever.” 

“Ain’t I?” Zeb wanted to know, a darker threat 
than before in his attitude and word. He ad¬ 
vanced to the foot of the table. “I’m a goin’ to 
walk up the middle of that table and kick that 
crock of clabber between the eyes, then I’m a goin’ 
to smash this joint to kindlin’ and take that woman 
by the hair of the head and whip her through this 
town with a blacksnake! I’ll show her how she 
can disgrace me and drag my name in the dirt! ” 

He made a move as if to set foot on the table. 
The guests at that end rose in panic, and retreated 
to the wall, where they stood looking at Smith, 
afraid of him, but their curiosity to know what he 
was going to do holding them there at the risk of 
his violence. The preacher went to him and tried 
to reason it out, making mention of the regularity 
of the proceedings, bearing down on the divorce. 

“Divorce nothin’! I don’t believe she ever got 
any divorce!” Zeb swore. 


92 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


Mrs. Goodloe snapped him up on that like a 
fish taking a fly. 

“Show him your divorce paper, Malvina!” 

Trembling, but eager to vindicate herself, Mal¬ 
vina left the table. Texas stood in the door watch¬ 
ing it all, ashamed for the bridegroom, who sat there 
and allowed such gross insults to be heaped upon 
himself, his bride, their guests. 

Malvina came back in three jumps, the paper in 
her trembling hand. The minister passed it on to 
Smith, and Mrs. Goodloe made a noise of exulta¬ 
tion that sounded as if she tried to crow. 

Smith ran his red eyes over the document, grunt¬ 
ing now and then. When he had made a speedy 
end of his inspection he looked hard at the bride, 
who was standing with her hand on her new hus¬ 
band’s shoulder as if to assure him that she would 
die at his feet before harm should come to one hair 
of that oiled and scented head. 

“It ain’t worth hell room!” said Smith. He 
tore the precious paper across, threw the pieces on 
the floor, set his spurred heel on them with stamp of 
contempt. 

“Sir—” the minister began. 

“You can’t divorce a man without servin’ notice 
on him,” Smith declared, and with such an amount 
of judicial severity, judicial certainty, in his tone 



THE LISTENING MAN 


93 


that many of them feared for the reputation of 
Malvina on the spot. 

“It won’t stick before no court in the land, and 
I’m goin’ to bust it wide open!” Smith declared, 
looking about defiantly. 

Texas saw at a glance how the matter stood in 
Smith’s intention. He had come back to discover 
more prosperity than he ever had been on speaking 
terms with before in his life; he saw ahead of him 
a season of ease and consequence in Cottonwood 
as the husband of its foremost business woman, and 
he believed the wedding was only a form, as far 
as matters had gone, that could be brushed aside. 

“Ye-e-es, you’ll bust a hamestring gittin’ out of 
here, you onery, low-lived, suck-aig whelp!” 

Mrs. Goodloe drew a little nearer to him as she 
delivered this, shaking her fist close to his sullen 
nose. The groom drew himself up in his chaii a 
little at this hopeful demonstration. 

“Git out o’ here, you bum! ” he said. 

But not very forcibly. It was too plainly weak, 
in fact, as if he had no confidence in it himself, 
to act as anything more than an enraging barb un¬ 
der the tough skin of Zebedee Smith. 

Then followed a spry little game of hop and 
dodge between Smith and Mrs. Goodloe, that fair 
lady’s teeth bared in front of him like a rampant 


94 THE TRAIL RIDER 

lion’s as he made little starts and snarls toward the 
groom. 

Mrs. Goodloe was the only person in the room 
who was not afraid of Smith to the roots of the 
hair, for it was not a gathering of fighting people. 
Texas judged that they were of the professional 
class mainly, such as saddle-makers, horseshoers, 
and grocers. 

“Let me to him!” said Smith, his hand on his 
gun. 

“You clear out of here before I scald the hide 
off o’ you!” Mrs. Goodloe warned. 

She laid hold of the large coffee-pot that stood 
like a portly guest at the right hand of her plate, 
and attempted, earnestly and valiantly, to pour 
its steaming liquor down Zeb Smith’s boots. He 
jumped back as a stream of the aromatic fluid 
spouted toward him, and saved his legs, but caught 
it on the toes. 

Mrs. Goodloe pushed her advantage, crowding 
Smith back toward the door where Texas stood. 
The groom lifted in his place as Smith retreated, 
like a turtle putting his head up behind a log. 
Mrs. Goodloe made a long swing with the pot and 
caught Smith with a good hot stream across the 
legs above his boots. 

Smith let a roar out of him that made the lemon 
pies on the table quake, and sent the rising courage 


THE LISTENING MAN 


95 


of the groom down again with his long body half 
under the table. Smith drove at the coffee-pot and 
kicked it high out of Mrs. Goodloe’s hand. It fell 
near the minister, who at once made a jump for 
the door. 

Smith was standing in the steaming confusion, 
his big gun in his hand, as the minister reached 
Texas. 

“For Heaven’s sake, do something—do some¬ 
thing !” he appealed. 

“Sir, if you wish it,” Texas replied. 

Texas walked gravely into the room. But under 
his dignified coat, under the solemn mask of his 
face, he was not one-tenth as serious as he seemed. 

Inwardly, he regretted having to spoil the fun, 
for it was the best show he had seen in many a day, 
and he would have liked, above everything, to see 
how far Smith would go. He laid his hand on 
Smith’s shoulder as he stood there swinging his gun, 
as if limbering his arm for destruction. 

“Sir, you’re the man that went off to the Nation 
one time to look around, I reckon, ain’t you?” 

Smith glared at him, fixing his mouth in the 
expression of a man who was in the habit of eating 
them raw, bending his brows in a most ferocious 
frown. 

“What if I was? Who in the hell’re you?” 

Texas did not approve of that kind of language 


96 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


before ladies. Something came into his eyes and 
changed over his face that caused Smith to alter the 
set of his jaw. 

“I don’t reckon you got through lookin’ around 
down there, pardner.” 

Texas said it with a conclusiveness that made it 
indisputable. Smith backed away from him, 
watching him as a coward watches one from whom 
he expects a well-deserved kick. He fumbled for 
his holster as he put his big gun away. The bar¬ 
ber was rising again, stretching his long neck to 
see, and Smith backed on toward the door. 

“I guess you better go on back there and get 
through with it,” Texas suggested. 

“Well, I reckon I will,” Smith returned. 

The barber was out from under the table, quite 
life-size and natural to behold, when Smith passed 
out of the door. As the sound of his feet ceased 
across the office floor, telling that he had gone on 
his way to resume his unfinished business of look¬ 
ing around down in the Nation, Mr. Noggle 
laughed. It was a high-keyed, quavering sort of 
a hen laugh that did not add a thing to the figure 
he had made of himself throughout the affair. 

Mrs. Goodloe was the first to reach Texas. She 
caught him as he was retreating modestly after 
Smith, and patted him on the back, and drew him 
into the room again, and called him “honey.” The 


THE LISTENING MAN 


97 


minister was next, and then the whole crowd came 
spilling over him, with chicken on their hands, 
slapping him on his new coat, and confusing him so 
that his face was as red as if he had been taken 
sneaking the barber’s ring from the finger of the 
bride. 

They wouldn’t allow him to go; he had to sit 
right down there at the table and have some sup¬ 
per, which was going to go so merrily now for his 
timely interference with the murderous intentions 
of Zebedee Smith. There was another pot of cof¬ 
fee in the kitchen, Mrs. Goodloe said, and she went 
off to fetch it, and the preacher’s wife took the 
broom from Malvina when she would have swept 
up the grounds from the floor, and swept them up 
herself, and everybody laughed, and the color came 
back to Malvina’s face. 

The solemn declaration of Texas that he had 
dined, and that he could not make room for another 
bite, was laughed down. The minister’s wife made 
a place for him beside herself, and he was obliged 
to take it, for he was too timid and gentle, too lack¬ 
ing in the subtleties of polished society to hurt the 
feelings of anybody, even anybody as unworthy as 
the groom. 

And when Malvina cut the cake, the first piece 
of it went to Texas, and when he took it she gave 
him a look that the minister, sitting at her right 


98 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


hand around the corner of the table, read as plainly 
as he ever read a book in his life. It was a look 
that said she would give her new husband, and the 
green hotel, and all that she possessed in this world 
and once held dear, for a man like the tall, lank 
stranger, with the straight dark locks of hair on his 
sun-brown temples. 

Mrs. Majors, the preacher’s wife, was an athletic 
young woman who wore no stays. She moved 
about with a swinging motion to her body above the 
hips very suggestive of combativeness, and Texas 
wondered whether the Rev. Mr. Majors might not 
have a pretty warm time of it now and then. 
She had scanty light hair, which she twisted up into 
the Psyche knot, just at that time becoming again 
popular with the ladies who followed the styles. 
Her forehead was lofty, and clear of the bangs such 
as Malvina and the other young ladies wore. 
Bangs were becoming passe as far west as Topeka. 
Mrs. Majors had anticipated the arrival of the edict 
in Cottonwood. 

The minister had not recognized Texas in his 
black coat as the man who had won first prize in 
the men’s roping contest at the fair that afternoon, 
and nobody at the table connected him with the 
spectacular bit of gunnery in the street that had 
set the whole town talking about the new gun¬ 
slinger who had come to join Cottonwood’s notables 


THE LISTENING MAN 


99 


in that line. Only Mrs. Goodloe had a possible 
clue to it, and it had slipped her mind in the ex¬ 
citement of getting rid of Smith. It did not occur 
to her again that this was Uncle Boley Drumgoole’s 
friend until the minister’s wife asked him where he 
was from, when he arrived, and how long he ex¬ 
pected to remain. 

Mrs. Goodloe pulled the puckering string to her 
short upper lip and prepared her face for speech, 
but Texas had informed the minister’s wife that he 
came from Texas, and that he expected to stay 
around in that part of the country a right smart 
spell before she was ready to put in a word. 

“Why, you must be the gentleman that won the 
ropin’?” she said. 

Texas admitted that he was, and the minister put 
down his napkin and leaned over to look round his 
wife and stare at Texas with his mouth open, 
amazement in his eyes. 

“Why, you’re the man that horsewhipped the 
mayor and shot Budd Dalton through the arm!” 

The minister pushed back his chair, came round 
and shook hands with Texas, very energetically, 
very warmly. The groom rose in the length of his 
legs, red to the eyes in the pleasure of such a dis¬ 
tinguished guest and champion. The others 
pressed round to shake hands and look Texas over 
with new interest and respect, for the bride’s cake 


100 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


was eaten down to crumbs, and it was time for the 
party to leave the table. 

So the very reluctant Texas found himself the 
center of a soiree, with husky professional men— 
the foreman of the railroad roundhouse was one of 
them—slamming his shoulder-blades, and smiling 
young ladies coming up and giving him timid 
hands, and Mrs. Goodloe showing teeth like a wal¬ 
rus. It was a whirl and a babble, with the dark 
mark of the coffee on the floor, innocent stain of 
the conflict with the forces of Smith, routed and 
dispersed forever from the threshold of the green 
hotel. 

The initiation of Texas into the polite and re¬ 
spectable society of Cottonwood was at this point 
when a man appeared in the door through which 
Zebedee Smith had so lately passed to resume his 
reconnoiter in the Nation. He stood there with his 
hat in his hand, a strong perfume of violets com¬ 
ing from him, a fluff of white handkerchief show¬ 
ing most elegantly from the breast-pocket of his 
almost sky-blue coat. 

In spite of his elegance, Texas recognized him as 
Dee Winch, the bow-legged man who had taken 
such an effective hand in his behalf when the crowd 
rushed him at the fair. Mrs. Goodloe went beam¬ 
ing over to him, her hand out in welcome. 

“Well, you’re a purty-lookin’ feller, ain’t you— 


THE LISTENING MAN 


101 


cornin’ in after it’s all over and everything’s gone!” 

“I’m very sorry, mom, but I had some business 
on hand that come up unexpected.” 

“I know you’d ’a’ come, Dee, if you could,” she 
said seriously, as if she knew very well that Dee 
Winch was a man of his word and was tender on 
the point of it. And so the others went to shake 
hands with him, the groom high among them, like 
a camel, and Malvina came bearing a piece of cake 
on a plate, smiling like an open fire. 

“I saved a piece for you, Dee; I knew you’d 
come,” she said. 

Dee Winch took the cake and tasted it, and 
vowed it was the best he ever had put into his 
mouth, and said there wasn’t a bit of use asking 
who made it, for it was sweet with a delicacy that 
only one hand in the world could give it. And the 
men laughed and whacked Dee on the shoulder- 
blades, and the ladies said, “Oh, hursh!” and 
poked Malvina in the side, causing her to turn red 
and giggle outrageously, for she was a ticklish lady, 
and couldn’t a-bear to be touched under the arms. 

Dee Winch shook hands with the bride and 
groom again, ceremoniously, with gravity, and 
wished them joy. He told the groom that he was 
the luckiest man in Cottonwood, and that he’d 
rather be in his place than the President’s. Then 
the minister brought Texas Hartwell forward and 


102 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


presented him to the late-coming guest formally, 
and the two of them stood a moment with clasped 
hands, looking into each other’s eyes. 

Hartwell saw that Dee Winch’s eyes were gray, 
and that there was a shadow in them as of a sor¬ 
row, or the pain of an affliction that he had kept 
hidden from the knowledge of men. The young 
man’s own dark eyes kindled to express the appre¬ 
ciation of one with so much apparent worth in him 
as little bow-legged Dee Winch. 

“I met you this afternoon, sir, and I’m under 
great obligation to you,” Texas said. 

“It’s the other way,” Winch assured him. 
“We’re all under obligation to you, a stranger, for 
doing what none of us here ever took in hand to 
do.” 

“It wasn’t because of a lack of men to do it, sir, 
but for want of an opportunity,” Texas returned. 

Mrs. Goodloe cut off further compliments at this 
point by announcing that the guests would retire 
to the parlor, where Viney Kelly was going to sing, 
and Viney Kelly herself took possession of Dee 
Winch, with the request that he turn her music for 
her. 

Miss Kelly was a lady of sentimental appearance, 
thin, as the general run of people in that country 
appeared to be. Her face was long, her cheeks 
meager, her mouth large and flexible. She took 


THE LISTENING MAN 


103 


her seat at the organ with much disposing of the 
skirt and flattening of the music-sheets, making 
much of her opportunity, flouncing herself into the 
notice of everybody before she struck a note. Miss 
Kelly was not of the school that wastes its talents 
on barren air. 

Dee Winch took up his stand at the end of the 
organ on Miss Kelly’s right hand, as vigilant as 
if he waited to draw his deadly gun on some ex¬ 
pected foe. His hand was over the little music- 
rack—made in representation of the classic lyre— 
ready to flip the page the second that Viney came 
to the last word. 

It was not a very enlivening melody for a wed¬ 
ding that Viney began to draw from the little 
brown instrument. When she came to the words 
it seemed to Texas to be almost tragically inappro¬ 
priate. It concerned a lady who loved a gentleman, 
and was present at his nuptials with another, and 
the chorus of it, which came with depressing fre¬ 
quency, was: 

“I’ll be all smiles to-ni-i-i-ight, 

I’ll be all smiles to-night; 

Though my heart should break to-mor-r-ow, 

I’ll be all smiles to-night.” 

Viney sang it with great feeling, weaving gently 
from side to side in rhythm with the tune. Texas 


104 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


wondered if her heart had been set on the barber, 
and if this could be her lament and renunciation. 
But whatever sentiment might have inspired the se¬ 
lection, she followed it unwaveringly to the end, 
where: 

“And then the room he en-tered, 

The bride up-on his ar-r-to—” 

and her heart—the composer’s, not Miss Viney’s— 
broke right on the spot, without being able to put 
it off until dawn. 

They applauded Miss Viney with hearty hands. 
If anybody besides Texas was struck by the hu¬ 
morous inaptitude of the selection it was not the 
bridegroom, indeed. He was loudest of the loud 
in his clamor for more, and he turned to Texas 
as Miss Viney swung round on the stool and began 
the prelude to another tune. 

“That’s what I call music ” said he. 

Texas nodded. Mr. Noggle leaned over, com¬ 
ing so close to Texas that the perfume on his hair 
was almost overwhelming. 

“Whan she throws that mouth of hern wide open 
you can see her appetite,” he said, “but she can 
sing to a fare-you-well! ” 

Texas was tired, for he had taken the road be¬ 
fore dawn of that eventful and long-drawn day. 


THE LISTENING MAN 


105 


Now he saw Mrs. Majors casting eyes at him again, 
and he feared that she was about to assail him with 
more questions on his origin and future intentions. 
While he had nothing to conceal, he did not feel 
that a man should tell all that he knew at once, 
so he withdrew to the office while Miss Viney was 
sighing through the last stanza of “ ’Tis a Flower 
from My Angel Mother’s Grave.” 

Dee Winch escaped during the applause, also, 
and came out on his toes, sweating like he’d under¬ 
gone an examination for a civil-service job. 

“I like music,” he said softly, with a cautious 
look back over his shoulder, “but I like it off a 
little piece.” 

“Yes, sir, there’s kinds of music that a man ought 
to pay for, and—other kinds,” Texas allowed. 

“Yes,” said Winch, looking carefully around the 
office, “it’s like the sign of a Mexican dentist I saw 
in San Antone one time. ‘Teeth pulled without 
pain, one dollar; with pain, fifty cents.’ The 
pleasanter it is, the more a man ought to be willing 
to pay. I met Uncle Boley Drumgoole as I was 
cornin’ over here. He was tellin’ me you thought 
some of trail-ridin’?” 

“I’ve got to find a job of some kind. I thought 
I’d try for trail-ridin’.” 

“Well, I’ve been hirin’ myself out to the associa- 


106 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


tion for that same kind of a job—that’s what made 
me late to this blowout. I’ve just come from a 
session with old man Duncan.” 

“I aimed to see him in the morning. Do you 
reckon it would be any use?” 

“I was goin’ to say that they’ve put me in as a 
sort of a boss rider, and I’ll be more than glad to 
give you a job if you’ll take it.” 

“I sure am obliged to you, sir, and I’d snap it 
up in a minute if I had a horse.” 

“I’ve got that all fixed. Be ready to start in the 
morning—I’ll ride around here after you. Head¬ 
quarters is at Duncan’s ranch, about twenty miles 
south. I think maybe you’ll have to wait around 
there a day or two till I can line them other fellers 
out and drop them I don’t want.” 

Winch went back to the parlor and excused him¬ 
self, and gave the bride and groom a little jocular 
advice to leave things merry after him. 

“Well, so-long till morning, Texas,” he said as 
he came out through the office. He shook hands 
with a quick and sincere clasp and passed out into 
the street. 

Texas stood in the door looking after him, pon¬ 
dering over the many sides that he had glimpsed in 
this remarkable little man. One peculiar thing he 
had noted of Winch, and that was his ceaseless 
watchfulness. No matter where he stctod, or 


THE LISTENING MAN 


107 


whether he was serious or gay, he never appeared 
to be entirely relaxed. Always there was the ten¬ 
sion of the man who waits, listens, feels with all 
his faculties, for something unexpected and unan¬ 
nounced. It was as if he listened for a step behind 
him, or expected a touch on the shoulder, or a 
whisper in his ear. 

That shadow in his eyes was growing out of his 
constant strain, Texas knew. It must be a heavy 
thing to go carrying the responsibility for sending 
so many men out of this life’s activities as Winch 
had dismissed, he thought. There must be a good 
many ghosts behind a man who was accountable 
for the lives of nineteen men, ghosts of accusation, 
doubt; of speculation, of unrest, and perhaps re¬ 
morse. 

He was glad that matters had turned out so for¬ 
tunately for him in his encounter before Uncle 
Boley’s door. If that old pistol of Ed McCoy’s had 
been the breadth of a hair less true there might have 
been human life against his peace that night. The 
thought of it started a sweat on his forehead. He 
prayed deep from his soul that he might never 
become a listening man like Dee Winch, straining 
and restless, with the unheard step of a feared ret¬ 
ribution behind him, the memory of dead men’s 
faces clouding his eyes with shadows. 


CHAPTER VIII 


INTERLUDE 

D UNCAN’S ranch-house was a large T- 
shaped building, constructed, like nearly 
all the ranch-houses of that country, of 
the tenacious prairie sod. It stood on the bank of 
a weak, shallow stream, and there were cottonwood 
trees around it, making a cool and pleasant harbor 
to reach in the middle of a thirsty day, after a ride 
that grew more desolate and barren as the traveler 
proceeded southward from Cottonwood. 

Texas and Winch had not made a forced ride of 
it; therefore it was almost noon when they turned 
their horses into the spacious corral with the little 
creek cutting across its corner. With the thrift of 
his Scottish kind Duncan had fenced off land in a 
little pocket of the creek bottom back of his house, 
and planted a garden there. Very green and hope¬ 
ful it looked to the eyes of the two men, and so 
strange a sight in that land, undisturbed by the 
plow, that they stood at the fence to admire it. 

Mrs. Duncan came to the door and hailed them, 
the two Misses Duncan showing blonde heads over 
her shoulders. So the two men turned from the 
108 


INTERLUDE 


109 


vegetables in Malcolm Duncan’s garden to the flow¬ 
ers within his house, where Mrs. Duncan greeted 
Winch by his first name with the familiarity of an 
old friend, and shook hands like a man with Texas 
Hartwell, and presented her daughters. 

“Malcolm home?” Winch inquired. 

“No. Him and the girls got home about mid¬ 
night from the fair, and he was in the saddle at 
daylight this morning to see how things is goin’ 
with the boys.” 

Mrs. Duncan spoke with the twang of Indiana 
on her tongue. She was a lady of large girth, with 
a red wrapper and a red face. Outwardly and in¬ 
wardly she appeared to be exceedingly hot. Her 
daughters gave no promise of following the mater¬ 
nal lines. They were straight-backed and tall, 
rather handsome, and cool as daisies in the field 
in their white dresses. To Texas they appeared 
out of place in that island of a home in the great 
raw sweep of prairie, for they carried themselves 
as if they had been accustomed to meeting people 
all their lives. 

They recognized Texas as the man who had won 
first place in the roping contest, and spoke of his 
work with compliments. Texas felt like a rooster 
with his tail feathers plucked, he admitted to him¬ 
self, when it came to sitting down to dinner with 
those young ladies in his shirt-sleeves. But there 


110 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


was no help for it. The long-tailed coat was in 
Cottonwood, in the keeping of Mrs. Goodloe at the 
Woodbine Hotel, and it might be many a long day, 
he thought, before it would grace his back again. 

“We’ve been lookin’ all morning for Sallie Mc¬ 
Coy and her mother,” Mrs. Duncan said. “They 
promised the girls they’d come over to-day, but I 
guess they didn’t get an early start.” 

“They used to be neighbors of ours,” the Miss 
Duncan near Texas explained, nodding her pretty, 
fair head to indicate the location in a general way. 
“Their ranch was down* the creek about seven or 
eight or nine miles.” 

“Yes, it was ten or ’leven or twelve,” said her 
mother, laughing over the indirect description. “A 
body never would get anywheres if they had to go 
by you tellin’ ’em the road, Naomi. Them girls” 
—to Texas—“has been away to school back in 
Lawrence so long they’ve plumb got out of the ways 
of this country.” 

“They sure speak well for the schools of Law¬ 
rence, anyway, ma’am.” 

Texas spoke with such forceful warmth that the 
simple compliment seemed something altogether 
grand. 

“Why, mother, we’ve been coming home for three 
months every summer,” the other one protested, as 


INTERLUDE 111 

if hurt by the implication that they were strangers 
in their own land. 

Mrs. Duncan sighed, and said she knew it as 
well as they did, she guessed, but it didn’t seem like 
they came home oftener than once every five years. 
Then she went on to tell Texas about her boys, five 
of them, all big enough to count as men in the work 
of the range, and that the other girl’s name was 
Ruth, and that she was two years older than Naomi, 
and that Naomi would be eighteen her next birth¬ 
day. All of which intimate information—for what 
can be more intimate among all a lady’s secrets than 
her age—did not appear to disconcert the girls in 
the least. 

Dee Winch did not say much, but there was a 
sufficiency in what he did say which gave one the 
feeling that he had said considerable. Texas an¬ 
swered Mrs. Duncan’s ramifications from her orig¬ 
inal subject into an inquiry into his life, adven¬ 
tures, family, and prospects with a shyness of man¬ 
ner and softness in his words that caused the young 
ladies to lean and listen when he spoke. 

He told her as much about himself as he had told 
the minister’s wife, and short cuts and sharp turns 
could not draw from him anything more. It 
seemed a simple story for a man who had come to 
Cottonwood like a whirlwind and made himself a 


112 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


figure in it to such an extent as he had done. 
Maybe she believed it, maybe she did not. 

Winch was off about his new duties immediately 
after dinner, with a word to Texas that he would 
return in a day or two and assign him to his post. 
He took nothing at all to eat but a package of dried 
beef, and dried beef of the range days was not the 
tender delicacy of this packing-house age. It was 
dried, and it required confidence to approach it, 
teeth to chew it, and a stomach equal to a corn 
sheller to do the rest. Texas wondered if pulling 
on dried beef had given Winch’s teeth the peculiar 
outward slant that he had noticed when he saw him 
first. He believed that it was equal to it, anyhow. 

Sallie McCoy came riding to the ranch alone 
along toward evening. Her mother had not felt 
equal to making the trip in the sun, Texas heard 
her explaining from where he sat on a bench under 
a cottonwood reading the poems of Robert Burns. 
He closed the book, moved more by the living poetry 
of Sallie McCoy’s eyes than the written word, and 
went forward to take her horse. 

She appeared taller afoot than in the saddle, still 
not too tall for a man whose heart was the proper 
distance from the ground. And there was some¬ 
thing in her way of putting down her feet when she 
walked, something in the grace of her body and the 


INTERLUDE 113 

soft charm of her voice, that told him she was not 
of common stock. 

Blood may wander far, and lodge like blown 
seed in strange places, but it will set its mark as 
unfailingly in the wilderness as in the palace. 
Blood had set its mark in this girl’s face, in the 
true modeling of her body, slender and strong. 
Somewhere in the race of McCoys there had been 
a hero, near or far. 

Texas thought her shy when Mrs. Duncan intro¬ 
duced them, yet there was something in her eyes 
which seemed to be for him alone, a struggling ex¬ 
pression, he felt it to be, for what convention could 
not allow from lips. It was gratitude, with some¬ 
thing softer which eluded him like a swift bird, 
and tingled him to the toes. Texas put his arm 
round the neck of the little cow pony that had stood 
him in such friendly service the day before, and 
stroked its nose. 

“I’m under great obligations to you for tendin’ 
this horse to me yesterday, Miss' McCoy. I didn’t 
have any chance to thank you then, for I didn’t 
know till after he carried me to victory whose horse 
he was—Uncle Boley didn’t tell me. I want to 
thank you now, and pay inter-est on it.” 

“If you ever owed me even thanks, it is paid, 
Mr. Hartwell,” she told him with great seriousness. 


114 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


“The debt and the interest are on the other side.” 

Hearing them talk so right at the beginning, and 
knowing the history of the encounter between Texas 
and the mayor, and the subsequent attempt to kill 
Hartwell in the street, the Duncans looked on him 
as Sallie’s personal champion. It was doubtless 
out of this feeling that he belonged peculiarly to 
Sallie that the Misses Duncan found a great deal to 
do in the kitchen, although Mrs. Duncan’s broad 
back was left ordinarily to bear such tasks alone, 
after the ways of daughters the world across. 

They were very well acquainted by the time sup¬ 
per was ready, old friends when it was over, and 
the Misses Duncan were clattering the dishes off. 
The girls were in a flutter now to have things out 
of the way, for more company was coming, young 
men, to be sure, from the ranch above. 

A young man was a young man in that country 
then, no matter what his occupation or whence he 
came, but these two proved to be exceptions to whom 
advantages had been given, just as Duncan and 
his wife, and the Kansas pioneers more than the 
pioneers of any place in the nation, had made sac¬ 
rifices to outfit their children for a higher plane. 
They were the sons of a rancher, and they had been 
at Lawrence attending the university, also. They 
were rather boisterous, and unduly familiar in 
their way of addressing young ladies, Miss McCoy 


INTERLUDE 


115 


included, by their first names. So it seemed to 
Texas, at least, his culture being of another kind. 

There was a good deal of singing, between the 
Duncan girls and the young men, with loud accom¬ 
paniment on the large hoarse piano which, Texas 
understood, was a historic instrument, and a no¬ 
table one, in that section. Texas could not see 
much improvement over Viney Kelly’s efforts to 
entertain in the roistering tunes which the young 
men shouted, with the bits of sentimental embroid¬ 
ery contributed by Ruth and Naomi. He didn’t 
take a deep interest in it, although he tried to ap¬ 
pear greatly entertained, for many things came 
drifting into his mind calling for serious considera¬ 
tion. Sallie had hung back out of it on the plea 
that she did not know the new songs. She would 
not approach the piano, in spite of their entreaties 
and light banter. 

“And you the only one in the crowd that can 
really sing—unless it’s Mr. Hartwell?” Naomi said. 

Texas was quick to assure her that he could not 
lift a note. But his mind leaped back from fol¬ 
lowing the trend of graver things to the pleasant 
conjecture of what kind of a song Sallie McCoy 
would select if she should sing. As for her voice, 
he felt that he knew how it would sound, felt that 
he had heard it many a time before, indeed. There 
came over him suddenly a longing for its satisfying 


116 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


cadence, as for something known in happier times, 
denied through hardship and lonely days. 

But he would not ask her to sing, feeling that her 
heart would not be in it. The others were begin¬ 
ning it all over again when Malcolm Duncan came 
home. Texas was thankful that greetings made 
it necessary to suspend the din. 

Duncan was a splendid figure of manhood, tall 
and rugged, with the health of his clean life in his 
eyes. His broad forehead and short gray beard 
gave him an appearance more suited to a chair in 
a university than a seat in the saddle. It was plain 
where the girls got their comeliness. 

The Duncan girls took their strong-lunged ad¬ 
mirers out to gabble under the moon while the 
master of the house had his supper, leaving Texas 
and Sallie to follow, pairing off as ingeniously as 
birds. Sallie lingered a little behind the others, 
answering Duncan’s inquiries about her mother, 
and whether she had brought him the Kansas City 
paper. Texas waited in the hall-like passage be¬ 
tween the two sections of the house, where a bracket- 
lamp shone over the saddles and guns which hung 
along the wall. 

“I thought I knew that belt,” said Sallie, stop¬ 
ping where Texas had hung his gun. “I wonder 
how it came here?” 

“It’s mine—Uncle Boley gave it to me,” he ex- 


INTERLUDE 


117 


plained. “He told me it was carried once by the 
best man he ever knew.” 

“It was father’s gun,” she said softly. She had 
taken it down, and stood now looking at the heavy 
gear with her head bowed over it. Texas saw a 
tear fall on the chafed leather. He put out his 
hand as if to comfort or assure her. 

“I hope I’ll always be worthy of it, Miss 
McCoy.” 

“I’m sure you will,” she said, in simple sincer¬ 
ity. “Did you have it—was this the gun you—” 
She faltered over the thing she wanted him to un¬ 
derstand. 

“I owe my life to it already,” he said, with grat¬ 
itude almost reverential. 

“I didn’t see Uncle Boley before I left; I didn’t 
know. I’m glad he gave it to you; I’m glad you 
had it when that gang—” She lifted the holster to 
her lips, as if moved by a sudden emotion, and 
kissed the stock of the great black gun. She gave 
it to him then, her head thrown high, her eyes 
bright in the dim lamplight for the tears that hung 
in them unspilled. 

The others were out by the gate, filling the night 
with laughter. 

“Let’s sit here,” Sallie suggested, stopping where 
the moonlight came sowing down through the cot¬ 
tonwood upon a bench. 


118 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


Youth was with them, also, but laughter seemed 
to have gone its way out of their hearts that night. 
Not much was said between them as they sat there, 
for the thoughts of each were busy as weaving 
spiders working to stretch their nets before the 
dawn. But in a quarter of an hour of such half- 
silent communion much good or much hurt may 
come to a pair of young hearts all open for the writ¬ 
ing of the Great Adventure. 

When Duncan appeared in the door with his pipe 
and called to Sallie, they started like children out 
of sleep. 

“Come in and sing me my song, Sallie/’ he re¬ 
quested. 

She laughed a soft little protest, but rose at once. 

“It sounds better from a distance, the greater the 
distance the better,” she said, putting out her hand 
to stop Texas when he would have gone with her. 
“He never wants but that one song —his song, he 
always calls it. I’ll come back when the agony is 
over.” 

Presently the prelude to the sweet old melody 
came to Texas where he waited beneath the cotton¬ 
wood, his heart almost over at the window, it 
seemed to him, straining lest he lose one chord. 
The words of the song came softly: 

“Ever of thee I’m fondly dreaming, 

Thy gentle voice my spirit can cheer; 


INTERLUDE 


119 


Thou art the star that mildly beaming 

Shone on my path when all was dark and drear.” 

Texas stood up, as if he were in church. He 
closed his eyes and listened, and it seemed that 
tears were burning behind the lids, and that all the 
tender recollections of his life were coming back 
to him. Her voice was so soft, so clear in the ris¬ 
ing notes, so appealing in the tender tribute of the 
heart disinherited of its love. He felt that a lonely 
man must have written that song, and that only a 
pure woman could make the rest of the indifferent 
world understand how deep his sincerity had been, 
how sweetly pathetic his constancy. 

He did not know whether he breathed at all until 
she came to the end, and Malcolm Duncan clapped 
his great hands, and praised her in his great voice. 
But when she returned to him in the shadow of 
the cottonwood Texas took her hands and held them 
a moment in the grateful expression for which his 
heart could find no words. 

“I’d travel many a day to hear you sing that 
song again, Miss McCoy,” he said, his act of tak¬ 
ing her hands so sincerely a gallant, and at once 
grateful, expression of his emotions that a girl more 
prudish than Sallie McCoy could not have taken 
offense. She was fine enough to feel the unusual 
beauty of his compliment, and thanked him for it, 
with no pretense of concealing her pleasure. 


120 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


Texas went to make his bed in the haymow with 
the sound of dove’s notes in his ears. When he 
should have been asleep, repairing himself against 
to-morrow’s work, he lay speculating on what had 
passed that night, marveling over the additions one 
day can put to the long sum of a man’s experiences. 
For above all the experiences of his life thus far, 
this meeting and knowing Sallie McCoy was by far 
the most marvelous and beautiful. 

It was a refreshing interlude in the adventures 
of violence which had been his lot in that strange 
country, and it was too rare, no doubt, to come 
into his days again. In the morning, very likely, 
Dee Winch would come for him, and he would go 
away to ride the border trails. 

That was not a situation that could last long, 
nor one in which he should care to continue. In a 
month or two, perhaps, he would be following the 
wavering trail of his fortunes into some other place, 
and Sallie McCoy would be behind him, among the 
dear things of this world which his hand never 
could hope to reach. She was not for a footless 
man like him, and there was nothing on the horizon 
to promise the speedy mending of his condition. 
He must ride on, and forget, or, if not quite forget, 
think of returning only in dreams. 

He put his hand on the weapon that had been 
her father’s, feeling a new comradeship for it. 


INTERLUDE 


121 


Why had she kissed it with such deep emotion, 
and given it into his hand with such high pride? 
Surely not because of anything that it had done for 
him. The fact that it had saved his life could be 
nothing to her. She had caressed it for the sake 
of its old association. What might have been a 
bond between them under happier circumstances 
could only be a dear memento now, for a man of 
honor could not think of a maiden when he did 
not even own the horse that he rode. 


CHAPTER IX 


FORBIDDEN TERRITORY 

T HE plan of patrolling the border against 
Texas cattle was at once simple and effec¬ 
tive. Without any warrant of law for their 
measures of defense against the contagion of their 
herds, the Kansas drovers had established certain 
defined routes by which cattle from the Texas 
range could be driven to the railroad loading points 
within the confines of their state. For a hundred 
miles or more along the northern line of Indian 
Territory the trail-riders, of whom Texas Hartwell 
had become one, rode watching for the approach 
of Texas herds, to turn them aside from the for¬ 
bidden land. 

As Uncle Boley had explained to Hartwell, the 
ravages of Texas fever on the Kansas range had 
worked tremendous losses within the past few years. 
Proposed laws establishing a quarantine line 
against southern stock were before Congress, and 
they were passed in time, but not until the Texas 
drovers had spent every energy to prevent it. 

True, the routes fixed by the Kansas cattlemen 
were through the most arid part of the State, where 
122 


FORBIDDEN TERRITORY 


123 


water was scarce sometimes in the summer months, 
and the grazing poor. The Kansas range always 
has been the fattening place for Texas range cattle, 
for there is no grass that equals Kansas grass. 
The plan of Texas drovers had been to drive im¬ 
mense herds into that rich country, graze them 
slowly toward the railroad, fattening them as they 
walked leisurely to market. But they dropped mil¬ 
lions of fever ticks as they went along, and the bite 
of one of these tiny creatures was death to a north¬ 
ern animal. 

So they were to be kept out at all costs, even the 
cost of battle and the penalty of death. The trail- 
riders had been keeping the Texans to the pre¬ 
scribed routes, but there was a spirit of defiance 
growing below the quarantine line which indicated 
trouble of serious proportions. For that reason 
the border guards had been doubled. 

A man had to come highly recommended to get 
a job as trail-rider. It called for courage, and a 
good head in an emergency, ceaseless vigilance, 
trustworthiness beyond a doubt. It was the high¬ 
est compliment that the hardy men of that country 
could pay Texas Hartwell when they made him a 
member of that trusted band. He might have 
fought a score of battles in the streets of Cotton¬ 
wood and come out victor in every one of them, 
never to draw any recognition of his capabilities 


124 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


with a gun from them. But when he lifted his 
voice and hand in defense of the rights of a clans¬ 
man’s daughter, that was enough to pass him into 
the iron circle of their highest confidence. 

Texas did not realize this, for he was altogether 
too ingenuous to suspect that a community should 
reward a man for discharging a gentleman’s obliga¬ 
tions. He thought that Winch had hired him be¬ 
cause he had proved himself handy with a gun 
against odds, or as a personal appreciation of the 
thrashing he had given the mayor. 

In the two weeks that he had been riding trail, 
nothing had happened to break the autumnal peace. 
At morning he met at one end of his beat the man 
beyond him, and at evening the man from the other 
side. He was responsible only for the territory that 
he covered, a front of not more than ten or a dozen 
miles. Often a wave of the hand from a hilltop 
to tell that all was well was the only interchange 
between him and his comrades of the trail for days 
together. 

Thus the time passed in monotonous loneliness, 
nothing to break it except now and then some trav¬ 
eler in covered wagon on his way from Kansas to 
Texas with his family, or somebody who had tried 
the lure of the South and was returning, thinner 
of shank and more tattered and roped together than 
when he left. 


FORBIDDEN TERRITORY 


125 


The marvelous and cheering thing about it was 
that he never met one of these travelers, no matter 
which way he was headed, who was poor in hope. 
In the faces of all the ragged drivers there was 
something like the reflection of a far-away light, 
in their eyes the brilliant eagerness of souls upon 
an endless quest. If they had missed it in Kansas 
they were going to hit it in Texas; if Texas had 
failed of the bright promise, surely back in Kansas 
where the grass grew they would come into their 
own. 

So the surprise of hearing a human voice, and a 
woman’s voice at that, raised in song in the dusk 
of a certain evening as he rode his way, was almost 
startling to Texas. The singer was riding ahead 
of him, not in sight, and this was her song: 

“O-o-o, the roof was copper-bottomed 
And the chimney solid gold, 

On the double-breasted mansion on the square; 

But I lost a lot at keno, 

And I’ll never more behold 
The double-breasted mansion on the square.” 

Texas hurried on to overtake her, wondering why 
she should be riding in the same direction as he 
instead of across his trail. East and west travel¬ 
ers along the line of the Nation, as that part of 
Indian Territory inhabited by the Cherokees was 


126 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


commonly called, were rare, and nobody but cow¬ 
boys was ever heard to go along singing in that 
land. She heard him coming, and reined up on 
a knoll, where she stood quite clear against the 
last light of the west. 

“Hello!” she hailed, while he was still a hun¬ 
dred yards away. “Oh, it’s you Mr. Texas?” she 
said, surprise and relief mingling in her tone. 

“It most surely is,” said he, his wonder enlarg¬ 
ing to discover that she was Fannie Goodnight, the 
girl who had saved him from the humiliation of 
arrest by her interference with the mayor. “I won¬ 
der what in the name of time brought you away 
down here into this lonesome country, Miss?” 

“I guess I’m lost, Texas,” she said, with a short 
little laugh. 

He looked at her queerly, but could not make 
much out of her face, for it was growing dark. 
But he noted that she was not wearing the elegant 
green costume on this unaccountable excursion, 
miles away from any human abode. Her dress 
was of some dark material; she wore a handker¬ 
chief round her neck in the cowboy style. 

“It’s funny for you to be singin’ along that way 
and you lost,” he said, more in the manner of spec¬ 
ulation than address. 

“Oh, I wasn’t worried; I knew I’d come out 
somewhere, and I’ve got a sack of grub. I’ve been 


FORBIDDEN TERRITORY 127 

at Colby’s ranch down in the Nation—you know 
where it is?” 

“No, ma’am, I don’t.” 

“It’s twenty-five or thirty miles below the line. 
Colby married my cousin. She’s part Indian, so 
am I.” 

“You don’t tell me!” 

“I guess that’s why I wasn’t worried when I lost 
the trail and got kind of turned around down there 
in the hills.” 

“Where were you headin’ for, Miss?” 

“Cottonwood.” 

“It’s close on to sixty miles from here, due north. 
You was headin’ east.” 

“Well, I knew I’d come out somewhere.” 

“Yes, I guess you would.” 

He didn’t believe her, unsuspecting as his nature 
was. There was nothing at all uncommon in a 
woman of the range country undertaking a ride like 
that, through a section where there was little danger 
to be met, but a woman whom her relatives would 
trust to such an undertaking would not be the one 
to ride east when her road lay to the north. She 
interrupted his perplexing thought. 

“Is there any water around here? I’m dying for 
a drink.” 

“There’s a spring branch along a couple of miles. 
I was aimin’ to camp there to-night.” 


128 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


“Do you mind if I stop there with you and cook 
my supper? When the moon comes up I’ll ride 
on.” 

“I was just goin’ to ask you to take a sup of cof¬ 
fee with me. But I’m afraid there won’t be any 
moon to-night, miss; it looks like it might cloud 
up and rain.” 

“If it does I’ll have to wait till daylight. Well, 
I’ve got my slicker.” 

“You provide yourself like a regular old-timer 
when you stir around.” 

“I am an old-timer, I used to ride after cattle 
down at Colby’s. That’s where I learnt to rope.” 

“You’re mighty neat and handy at it, miss.” 

Texas felt that this compliment was due her, de¬ 
spite the underhanded scheme to defraud Sallie Mc¬ 
Coy and the public in which she had borne a part. 
Some way he felt that she had been more of an in¬ 
strument than a designer in that shameful steal. 
Perhaps this softening toward her came from the 
service she had rendered before Uncle Boley’s door 
that evening the mayor had ordered his arrest. 

“I’m not as good with a rope as I used to be, 
Texas,” she said. But for all this modest dis¬ 
claimer he could see that she was pleased by this 
compliment. 

But what was she doing there? That was what 


FORBIDDEN TERRITORY 


129 


troubled Texas for an answer as he rode beside her 
toward the stream. For a woman who had lost 
her way she was mightily composed and easy of 
mind. Perhaps that was her nature, having been 
around so much, and accustomed to meeting all 
kinds of people. It was the way, also, of one used 
to the life she said she had followed once. Yet he 
knew very well that anybody who had ridden after 
cattle on the range never would get turned around 
and drop the road in the broad of day. 

It was her own business, he concluded. If a 
woman wanted to go roaming around that way, let 
her go. This was a bold woman, with a large ex¬ 
perience among men, larger indeed, he feared, than 
had been good for her. She would take care of 
herself in her own way, no matter where she might 
make her bed. But she had no honest purpose 
there on the border. Texas was forced to admit 
that belief in spite of the promptings of gratitude. 

Texas gathered dry sumac for the fire, and that 
was as far as Fannie would allow him to go in the 
supper preparations. If he had doubted before 
that she ever had lived a cowboy’s life all misgiv¬ 
ings were dispelled at sight of her deftness with 
frying-pan over the little fire. She belonged to the 
craft; the slightest doubt of that was a slander. Of 
course, she couldn’t jide and throw a rope to com- 


130 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


pare with Sallie McCoy, but he knew that she could 
have done better than she did with that old trained 
steer. 

She sat cross-legged like an Arab beside the fire, 
her hat on the ground, the light in her beautiful 
black hair, strong on the white and pink of her 
handsome bold face, turning the flapjacks with a 
flip of the pan, flashing them up like fish leaping in 
the sun. He stood by admiring her, for she com¬ 
pelled that as her due, no matter what secrets her 
heart carried, no matter what her adventures had 
been. 

“Texas ?” she said, not turning her eyes from 
her task. 

“Yes, ma’am.” 

“Call me Fannie: they all do. Texas, where did 
you come from?” 

“Kansas City, most recently, Miss Fannie.” 

“Oh, I mean where did you come from—where 
did you start? Here”—offering a tin plate of 
cakes and bacon—“sit down and begin your sup¬ 
per, and tell me about yourself. If you’ve got any¬ 
thing to hide, skip it. I’m pretty good on the 
guess.” 

“There isn’t anything in particular to hide, Fan¬ 
nie,” said he, thoughtfully, putting his hat down 
beside him as if he prepared for a ceremony. “I 
started in Taixas, and I come to the end of my 


FORBIDDEN TERRITORY 


131 


rope in Kansas City. Father had a ranch down 
on the Nueces, and we got smart and begun to drive 
cattle up to Dakota to supply the government. 
They butchered them for the Sioux, you know.” 

“And you drove one time too many, I guess, 
didn’t you, Texas?” 

Texas twisted his head in combination of assent 
and expression of seriousness as he reached for an¬ 
other cake. 

“You sure are good on the guess, too, Miss Fan¬ 
nie.” 

“Fannie,” she corrected, with gentle firmness. 

“Fannie,” he repeated, like a dutiful boy. 

“Go ahead, Texas; tell me about it.” 

“The last trip we drove in ten thousand. The 
Indians met us on the way and butchered them for 
themselves. But we got out of it right happily, you 
might say.” 

“Did they shoot you up any, Texas?” 

“Not to amount to much, Fannie.” 

“How much, Texas?” 

“Oh, three or four times, here and there.” 

“Three or four—which was it, Texas?” 

“Four, Fannie.” 

Fannie appeared to be thinking the situation 
over. She sat with her head bent toward the fire a 
little to keep the glare out of her eyes, and turned 
out two or three cakes before she spoke again. 


132 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


“I guess the government paid you for the cattle. 
What did you do with the money?” 

“The government never paid a dollar. I hope 
to get it some time, if I live long enough to see a 
bill through Congress.” 

“Well, what become of the ranch?” 

“We sold it and invested in real estate in Kansas 
City, on the advice of people we thought to be 
friends.” 

“Of course they skinned you.” 

“The Sioux Indians are gentlemen, Fannie, com¬ 
pared to them sharks back there.” 

“They rob you without any false pretenses,” she 
nodded. 

“Yes, you know who’s cleaned you out when they 
ride off.” 

“So you left your father up there and struck out 
to make another stake, did you, Texas?” 

Texas did not answer right away. He turned 
his head and looked off toward the south quite a 
spell, as if he considered this impertinence, and 
going into things a little too far. 

“I took him back to the old place to bury him, 
Fannie,” he said, simply, but with such pathos that 
it sounded like the cry of an empty heart. 

She poured herself a cup of coffee, keeping her 
head turned so the light would not fall on her face. 
Her voice was low and soft when she spoke again. 


FORBIDDEN TERRITORY 133 

“Your mother and the rest of them are still in 
Kansas City?” 

“Mother went many years before him. My mar¬ 
ried sister lives in El Paso. And so you know all 
about me now, Miss Fannie, from the cradle to 
Kansas.” 

She rolled a piece of bacon in a pancake and 
ate it like a banana. 

“You’re a Texas cowman, ridin’ trail for the as¬ 
sociation,” she said. “What would you do, Texas, 
if somebody you knew from down there was to 
come drivin’ a big herd up here and wanted you 
to let ’em through the quarantine line?” 

“It isn’t likely, Fannie, that anybody I know ever 
will come here doin’ that.” 

“Well, if somebody you didn’t know was to come 
from Texas and ask you to let them slip through 
this gap in the line you watch?” 

“You oughtn’t to ask me that, Miss Fannie.” 

She looked at him steadily a moment, reached 
out, touched his arm. 

“No, I oughtn’t. I know what you’d do without 
askin’. You’d fight till you had to prop your eyes 
open—you’d die before you’d let them through.” 

Texas seemed to be very much embarrassed by 
this expression of confidence. He looked round at 
the skies, his head tilted back as if he listened. 

“It sure is goin’ to rain, Fannie,” he said. 


134 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


“Texas”—her hand was on his arm again—“I’m 
not lost. I know right where I am, I know every 
inch of this country. I could go to Cottonwood as 
straight as a bullet.” 

“Yes, I suspected you could, Fannie.” 

“Texas”—earnestly, leaning toward him a little, 
the firelight in her bright eyes, her voice low— 
“there’s a big herd of Texas cattle not three miles 
from here, and they’re goin’ to drive through to¬ 
night! ” 

He looked at her sharply, startled a little at first 
by the earnestness of her voice, but recovered him¬ 
self almost immediately. He smiled as he threw 
a few small sticks on the fire to make a light. 

“Did you come down to tell me?” he asked, treat¬ 
ing it as if he considered it a joke. 

“Tell you! That gang made me come—I was to 
hold you here, right here by this creek, till morn¬ 
ing, so they wouldn’t run into you. Tell you, 
hell!” 

Texas was on his feet in a flash. There was no 
doubting the earnestness of her word, although he 
doubted whether she had given him the full truth 
of the scheme. She was beside him, looking ap¬ 
pealingly into his eyes. 

“Where are they, do you know?” he asked. 

“I expect they’re drivin’ across by now, west of 


FORBIDDEN TERRITORY 135 

here, just far enough away to be out of hearing. 
There’ll be somebody—” 

He started for his horse, hobbled near by. 
Fannie stopped him, her hand on his shoulder. 

“'They’ll kill me if they find out I told you, but 
I couldn’t double-cross you, Texas. I like you, kid 
—you’re clean —you’re the kind of a man I’d go 
through hell for, clear up to the neck!” 

He took her hand, with a swift look into her eyes. 

“I can’t tell you how much I appreciate what 
you’ve done, Fannie, nor how much I’m honored 
by your confidence. Hurry—get your horse! If 
you’ll start right now you can—” 

“Listen!” she whispered, her voice choked with 
fear. 

Texas had heard the slight movement beyond 
the small circle of their little fire, and had sprung 
away from her, his hand on his gun. 

“Run for your horse! ” he called to her, in alarm. 

She stood hesitant, the light of the fire on her 
face, her eyes great, fear in every feature. 

“They heard me—they’ll kill me!” 


CHAPTER X 


A VOICE TO REMEMBER 

REATA swished out of the dark as Fan¬ 



nie spoke. It caught Texas before he 


JL. could draw his gun. She saw him jerked 
off his feet, the rope binding his arms at his sides. 

In the struggle that he made to free himself, his 
captors dragged him across the little fire, scattering 
the light sticks, out of which the blaze died almost 
at once. Many hands laid hold of him; the raw- 
hide lariat was wound around his legs and arms, 
binding him like a mummy. They threw him 
down, and cursed him for his fight. 

A man with a whang in his voice like the high 
notes of a banjo was talking to Fannie over beyond 
the scattered brands of fire. He was railing at her, 
calling her unspeakable names, abusing her for her 
betrayal. 

“No, you don’t leave here—no, you don’t!” he 
said, in answer to something that Texas could not 
hear. “You wouldn’t double-cross him, wouldn’t 
you? Well, you’re not goin’ to double-cross us 
again, neither. You’ll go with us, and you’ll stay 
with us till you see this thing out!” 


A VOICE TO REMEMBER 


137 


“Yes, and if you hurt a hair of his head 1*11 put 
a bullet between your eyes if it takes me forty 
years!” she told him. “I did double-cross you, 
and I*m glad of it, and Ed do it—” 

He drowned her in a volley of abuse, yelled an 
order to somebody, and Fannie was taken away, 
protesting and defying as she went. The man who 
had cursed her came and bent over Texas, trying 
his bonds from shoulders to ankles, tightening them 
here and there, saying nothing. 

Texas was so securely tied that he could move 
nothing but his fingers. For a little while the fel¬ 
low stood looking down at him, as if he considered 
some additional precaution. 

“It’s putty tough medicine, Bud, but youTL have 
to stand it,” he said. 

“You might loosen the slip-knot around my 
arms a little if you're aimin' to leave me here, pard- 
ner. It’s cuttin’ off the blood from my hands. 
I'll be paralyzed.” 

The man laughed. “You're too damn handy 
with 'em anyhow,” he said, and walked away, leav¬ 
ing Texas staring at the clouded sky. 

Texas wondered whether one of them intended to 
come back and release him after they had driven 
their herd across, or whether it was their purpose 
to leave him there to die. The man who had 
spoken to him seemed to know something about 


138 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


him and his adventures in Cottonwood. No mat¬ 
ter who he was or whence he came, Texas was cer¬ 
tain that he would know him by his peculiar voice 
if he ever met him again. Surely there was not 
another voice in the world like that. 

Somebody in Cottonwood must still be in the 
business of importing Texas cattle, perhaps with 
his connection in such transactions hidden from 
the cattlemen of that country. Fannie had said 
“that gang” as if she meant somebody in Cotton¬ 
wood. These things Texas considered as he lay 
there, the pain of his tightly bound hands and feet 
increasing every moment. 

This grew so intense in a short time as to be 
alarming. Texas believed that he must perish of 
it, in lingering agony, if somebody did not come 
soon and set him free. The hard, braided rawhide 
lariat had been pulled as tight as the strength of 
excited and vindictive hands could draw it; it cut 
into his flesh and stopped the return flow of blood 
from his extremities. All the time the pressure of 
his heart was pumping a little more blood past the 
bonds, but there was no force to send it back. 

His hands were already swollen until he could 
not move his fingers. The pain was becoming 
maddening. He felt blood starting from beneath 
his finger nails; the gorged flesh ached and burned 
in an exaggeration of the wildest imaginings of 


A VOICE TO REMEMBER 


139 


pain. It was agony such as being chained in fire, 
only it was more prolonged. Insensibility was a 
condition to be prayed for, even though it might be 
the end. 

Texas shouted for help until his voice was only 
a moan; thrashed his body from side to side until 
he had no strength left to turn again, rebellious 
against this cruel punishment, frantic in his desire 
to burst his burning bonds. He gasped like a 
drowning man; his heart labored to suffocation 
against the poison of his stifled veins. Then in a 
rushing climax of pain his senses left him. His 
last wild, protesting thought was that he had come 
to the quicksands of death. 

The cool plash of rain in his face woke Hartwell 
from his swoon on the threshold of <|eath, and it 
was dawn. He was unable to believe for a while 
that the pain had gone out of his feet and hands, 
the pressure relaxed on his arms. His bonds hung 
loose on him, as if they had been cut. He could 
not believe it for a time, and had no strength to 
investigate, thinking, indeed, that it was only a rift 
in his incomparable visitation of cruelty. 

It came to him quickly that his release from 
agony was due to the rain. The nature of dry raw- 
hide is to stretch when wet, and the rain had come 
in time to ease the thongs which stifled his body 


140 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


and choked out his life. Little by little he moved 
his arms, working the muscles out of their stiffness, 
every movement bringing back a faint reminder of 
his old pain. It required a long time to get one 
hand out of the wet rope and into his pocket for his 
knife, another almost hopeless spell of fumbling to 
open it with his swollen, numb fingers. When he 
stretched free of thongs at last, day was well on its 
way. The rain continued from the low-blowing 
clouds which had followed the cattle from Texas, 
as if to give them obscurity for their invasion of 
the forbidden land. 

Texas found his feet and legs too tender to bear 
him at once. It was as if they had been frozen. 
Only after long chafing he was able to crawl, and 
crawling, he went to look for his horse, his inten¬ 
tion being to mount and carry the alarm straight to 
Malcolm Duncan’s ranch, almost forty miles to the 
north. 

There was no trace of the animal near at hand; 
he believed the invaders had driven it away. 
Near the site of last night’s fire he found his grub 
and scattered utensils where the invaders had 
kicked them about in the struggle. The circula¬ 
tion was restored to his extremities by the time he 
had cooked and eaten breakfast; it was possible to 
walk with little pain. 

Further search for the horse discovered no trace 


A VOICE TO REMEMBER 


141 


of it. Hours since he should have met the rider 
who patrolled the border to the east of him. Ac¬ 
cording to orders this man would wait a reasonable 
time at the established meeting point, and then 
would ride forward into Texas’s territory to find 
what was amiss. 

Without doubt this man had discovered the herd 
and was now on his way to give the alarm. There 
was nothing left for Hartwell to do but face toward 
the north and tramp it to Duncan’s ranch, doubly 
disgraced in the eyes of his employers. 

Burdened by this humiliation, he started, only to 
run across his horse a mile or so up the creek. The 
animal’s trail rope had become tangled in the brush, 
and it had wound itself up until it hadn’t an inch 
to spare. It was nearly noon when he mounted to 
ride to Duncan’s ranch. 

They were at supper at the Duncan ranch when 
a man on a mud-spattered horse drew rein before 
the low sod house in its nest of cottonwood^. He 
left the panting creature standing with legs apart 
like a new-born colt, its head drooping, its nostrils 
flaring as it puffed in its fatigue. His shout 
brought Duncan to the door. 

Dee Winch had ridden in not an hour before. 
He and Duncan’s sons held their clatter of cutlery 
to listen to the report the trail-rider began to make. 


142 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


At his first word Winch was on his feet, and in a 
second he had pushed past Duncan, where he stood 
bareheaded in the rain. 

“Eight to ten thousand of ’em,” the trail-rider 
was saying, “drove ’em through that Texas feller’s 
beat.” 

Dee Winch went into the hall and took down his 
belt with its double holster, his hat and coat. 

“How far have they come in?” Duncan inquired. 

“Fifteen or twenty miles by now.” 

“Did you look for Hartwell?” Winch asked. 
He was adjusting his belt, ready in those few sec¬ 
onds to take the road. 

, “I rode over to look for him when he didn’t meet 
me this morning, but I couldn’t find hide nor hair 
of him anywheres. Then I run onto the trail of 
that herd, and follered it till I overtook ’em. I 
think they’ve got twenty-five or thirty men in the 
outfit, and they’re as sassy as hell.” 

“They came expectin’ a fight, and they knew 
right ^here to hit the line,” Duncan said. He 
turned to Winch, his handsome face clouded and 
stern. “Do you think that stranger was in on it, 
Dee?” 

“I think most anything of him right now,” 
Winch returned. 

“It looks to me like he was in on it, and came 


A VOICE TO REMEMBER 143 

here for the purpose of gettin’ a job from us to 
open the gate to his friends.” 

“I never did like the slant of that feller’s eye,” 
the trail-rider said. 

“We’ve got to turn that herd back before any 
more damage is done,” Duncan said. “They’ve 
sown ticks enough by now to infect this whole range, 
like enough, but they’ve got to turn back and take 
the set trails if we have to kill off half of them, 
men and beasts, to make them do it! Boys, get 
your horses out!” 

He gave one orders to ride to this ranch, another 
directions to hasten to that. The frail-rider he in¬ 
structed to go in and eat his supper, then saddle a 
fresh horse and ride to the nearest ranch, rousing 
all hands to repel this insolent invasion. Dee 
Winch had gone for his horse. He was back for 
orders from Du ican while the others were getting 
into their slickers. 

“I think you’d better take a scout down there, 
Dee, to find out where they are, and warn them not 
to come this way another mile. Tell them in plain 
words we meant it when we set them trails for 
Texas cattle, and we mean it when we say they’ve 
got to get out of here as quick as the Lord will let 
them!” 

Winch swung into the saddle. Duncan lifted 


144 THE TRAIL RIDER 

his hand and stopped him as he was about to gallop 
away. 

“If you see that man they call Texas—well, 
you’ll know what to do; it was you that hired him.” 

“Yes, and by God, I’ll pay him off!” 

Winch’s voice was down in his throat, like the 
growl of a dog mouthing a bone. Duncan stood 
looking after him a moment as he galloped into the 
south, then turned into the house to belt himself 
for the fight. 


CHAPTER XI 


THE TEST 

W HEN Hartwell arrived at Duncan’s 
along in the night he found a strong 
party of ranchers and cowboys gath¬ 
ered to ride against the Texans and drive them 
back across the quarantine line. He had recovered 
fully from the hard experience of the night before, 
but his horse was spent, for he had not spared it 
in the ride of forty miles. 

Nobody among the men assembled knew him as 
he flung himself from his heaving horse in the 
light of the lanterns. He knew that the news of 
the Texans’ invasion had beaten him there by many 
hours when he saw the preparations going for¬ 
ward. A dozen men or more were gathered round 
a wagon into which supplies were being loaded from 
Duncan’s warehouse, their horses hitched along the 
fence. 

Duncan came out of the covered chuck wagon 
when he heard Texas inquiring for him, a lantern 
in his hand. He stood at the tail of the wagon, his 
lantern lifted high to look under it, throwing its 
145 


146 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


full light over Hartwell’s mud-spattered figure as 
he hurried up to report. 

“I’ve been a long time reachin’ here, sir,” said 
Texas, hardly knowing how to begin his tale of 
surprise, humiliation, and defeat. 

“Yes, you have,” Duncan replied, still holding 
the light aloft, looking sternly into the trail-rider’s 
face. 

The others drew near as Texas drove straight 
into his story. Out of gratitude for Fannie Good¬ 
night’s betrayal of the plot to him, although such 
betrayal had come too late, Texas kept her part in 
it to himself. 

“They roped me while I was eatin’ my supper by 
Clear Creek, sir, and tied me up so tight I almost 
died. I lost my senses and lay there thataway till 
the rain stretched the rawhide and eased it. I’ve 
come through to you, sir, as fast as I could come, 
but I realize I’ve made a mighty poor figure in the 
business, all the way through.” 

Duncan lowered the lantern, lifted it, looked 
again into the trail-rider’s face. 

“Yes, and you’re either one of that Texas outfit 
or you sold out to them!” Duncan charged. 

“That’s right!” spoke a voice out of the dark. 

“I felt that you might take it thataway,” said 
Texas, almost suffocated by his great shame and 
the injustice of this charge which he was powerless 


THE TEST 147 

to refute in any convincing manner by word or 
deed. 

“What did you take the trouble to come up here 
for, then? Haven’t you got sense enough to know 
you’ve rammed your neck right into the rope? 
We’re not fools enough to turn a wolf loose a sec¬ 
ond time.” 

Duncan’s manner was even more threatening 
than his words. It was plain that he believed 
Texas had betrayed his trust, and was so deeply 
set in that belief it would take something more than 
words to remove the conviction. The other men 
were ominously silent. 

“If I’d been one of them, or even sold out to 
them, I wouldn’t ’a’ come, Mr. Duncan, sir.” 

Texas had expected to meet suspicion and dis¬ 
trust, but he had not looked for such cold prejudg¬ 
ment and unfair passing of sentence. There was 
not a spark of resentment or anger in him, even 
at that; only a desire that was almost frantic to 
save his honor and clear himself of what appeared 
in the eyes of the cattlemen a monstrous crime. 

“We didn’t expect you to,” said Duncan 
shortly; “but now that you’re here you’ve saved us 
a lot of trouble.” 

There was a short laugh at that. The sound ran 
through the little knot of men like a growl. 

“I’ll go wherever you say, and I’ll do whatever 


148 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


you wish, to prove to you I’m square,” Texas told 
them earnestly. 

“You can begin by handin’ over that gun,” Dun¬ 
can suggested, reaching out his hand. 

Texas stepped back. There was a quick, un¬ 
easy movement among the others as they drew away 
from the wagon, as if to get out of the light, for 
Hartwell’s reputation with a gun had spread over 
the range from his meeting with Johnnie Mackey’s 
gang in Cottonwood. 

“I’ll go with you and help you turn them south¬ 
ern cow-men back, sir, or I’ll go alone and do my 
best to turn ’em, but, gentlemen, I’m goin’ to keep 
this gun.” 

Duncan did not speak for a little while. The 
others edged back into the circle of light, and drew 
near to where Duncan stood, judicial and gray, as 
if thinking the proposal over. 

“All right,” said he at last, “you can go with us. 
There’s a little man by the name of Winch that 
wants to see you, anyhow.” 

They dismissed Texas with that, and left him to 
his own devices while they hurried on with the 
freighting of the wagon. From the look of things 
they were preparing to make a regular campaign 
of it. Rations for many days were being loaded, 
and Duncan’s camp cook was hitching in two teams 
to haul the heavy wagon to the front. 


THE TEST 


149 


Texas changed his saddle to a fresh horse from 
among the number in the corral, nobody paying 
the slightest attention to him. Even Mrs. Duncan, 
who came and went between house and wagon like 
a laboring and anxious ant, did not speak to him 
when she met him face to face. 

It transpired that they were not waiting on the 
wagon, but for one of Duncan’s boys to come with 
an addition to the fighting force. The lad arrived 
an hour or so after Texas, bringing with him five 
men. Duncan sought Hartwell, where he sat on 
the very bench that he had occupied one tenderly 
treasured night with Sallie McCoy, his saddled 
horse near at hand. 

“You’ll ride in front with me,” said he briefly, 
and passed on. 

Long since the rain had blown by, and the stars 
were brilliant in the washed, clear air. Like shad¬ 
ows the men were mounting and gathering for the 
ride. Texas leaped into the saddle and followed 
Malcolm Duncan to the head of the party. They 
rode forward without a word. 

It was not an occasion for words, indeed. Texas 
realized that as well as the deepest concerned in the 
crowd. The fortunes of some of these men were 
menaced by that approaching herd of southern cat¬ 
tle. Between that night and the first killing frost, 
still several weeks off, disease might be spread by 


150 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


the ticks all over the range. Already miles of the 
finest grazing country had been infected. Graz¬ 
ing in the territory traversed by the Texas herd was 
at an end until next spring, and there would be a 
risk in it then. No wonder they were bitter against 
him, Hartwell thought. 

Morning disclosed that the Texans had rushed 
their long-winded cattle forward with little pause. 
They had penetrated twenty-five miles into the for¬ 
bidden country, and had come to camp now with 
their great herd spread wide, watched by double 
the number of herders usually employed to control 
that many cattle. 

Dee Winch met the defenders of the range at 
sunrise, coming from his camp on the flank of the 
Texas herd, where he had hung like a wily old 
wolf waiting the arrival of his friends. He did 
not return Hartwell’s greeting, but looked him 
straight in the face as he rode up to Duncan and 
made his report. 

The Texans were defiant, he said. They held 
themselves to be within their rights, and they would 
defend such rights at any cost. So there seemed 
to be no way out of it but through a fight. They 
rode on to the place where Winch had camped, 
talking it over between them. Winch and Duncan 
had a few words apart, about him, Hartwell be- 


THE TEST 151 

lieved, for after that Winch avoided him, and did 
not even look his way. 

Indeed, Texas felt himself as one considered of 
lower caste when the party dismounted at the little 
stream and set about getting breakfast from the 
emergency supplies which each man had brought 
behind his saddle. They ignored him so com¬ 
pletely that he withdrew down the stream a little 
way and made his fire. He had no coffee, and very 
little flour, for the rain had penetrated his mess that 
night he lay bound in the Texans’ thongs. But 
nobody inquired into his necessities, and he was 
too proud to make them known. 

There he broiled his last few slices of bacon and 
cooked a wad of dough on a stick, and ate his 
breakfast in bitterness of heart over this unjust, if 
not altogether unreasonable condemnation. His 
tobacco had been soaked by the rain, and the bit 
of it that he had dried in his palm before the fire 
had a miserable taste. All through, life had a bad 
flavor to him that morning, and there was not much 
on the horizon to offer him cheer. He was tired 
and sleepy, and glad only that there was sun in 
place of rain. As he sat there reflecting on his 
uncomfortable situation all round, Winch ap¬ 
proached. 

Texas looked up at him, not forgetting the cold 


152 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


unfriendliness that he had seen in Winch’s face a 
little while before, nor the ignored greeting that he 
had given him. He was in no mood now to risk 
another rebuff, so he held his peace and waited for 
Winch to unfreight his mind. 

“That’s a kind of a thin story you’ve come in 
with, young feller,” said Winch. He had stopped 
off a few feet from where Texas sat, and stood look¬ 
ing at him, a little twitching in his mustache as if 
he were about to smile. But there was no smile in 
his eyes, small and gray, smaller now for the frown 
on his sharp, thin face. 

Texas drew deep on his cigarette, tossed the butt 
into the fire, got up deliberately, turned and looked 
Winch straight in the eyes. 

“Yes, I admit it is a purty thin kind of a story 
to come into a crowd of suspicious men with, espe¬ 
cially men that have judged before they have heard 
any evidence at all.” 

“What do you call that if it ain’t evidence?” 

Winch pointed to the distant herd grazing on the 
forbidden grass. 

“It does look bad for a stranger from Taixas, 
I’ll admit, Winch.” 

“I didn’t take you for a man that would double- 
cross a friend that had done you a favor, Hart¬ 
well.” 

“No, you didn’t, Winch. And you measured me 


THE TEST 153 

right, sir. I wouldn’t double-cross a friend; I never 
did in my life.” 

“I look at this as a personal matter, Hartwell. 
I hired you; it all comes back to me to carry. That 
story of yours about bein’ roped is a purty hard one 
for me to swaller.” 

“It hurts me more to confess it than it does you 
to hear it, Winch. It’s the truth, and you can swal¬ 
ler it or you can spit it out, sir! ” 

Hartwell’s slow anger was beginning to rise; the 
injustice of it looked bigger to him every moment. 
The scowl darkened on Winch’s face; his big mus¬ 
tache twitched again as if he was about to smile. 

“HI spit it out, then!” he said. 

There was a challenge in the cold glare that he 
gave Hartwell; he stepped back a little, shaking his 
shoulders like a cock. 

“I didn’t seek a qua’l with you, sir,” said Texas, 
meeting him eye to eye, “nor with any man on this 
range. But I’ve got my name and honor to defend, 
sir, and I’ll defend ’em the best way I know how to 
do it.” 

“It’ll take a whole lot more than your own word 
to clear you, Hartwell.” 

“I’ve promised Duncan to help turn them cattle 
back over the line, and I’m goin’ to do it. If you 
want to see me afterwards, I’ll be at your service, 


sir. 


154 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


“I’ll want to see you, all right, pardner, unless 
this thing happens to turn out the way you tell it. 
If it does, I’ll take off my hat to you and apologize.” 

“I wouldn’t ask it of you, sir,” Texas returned 
loftily, plainly conveying to the notorious gun¬ 
slinger that his opinion, one way or the other, mat¬ 
tered very little. 

“We’re goin’ up there on the hill to call them 
fellers out for a talk and lay down the law. Dun¬ 
can wants you to go along with me and him and 
two or three more. We’ll be ready in a minute.” 

“I’ll be on hand when wanted, sir,” Texas said. 

He looked after Winch as he walked away, his 
hairy chaparejos accentuating the curve of his ri¬ 
diculous short legs until he looked more like a crab 
than a man. There was a feeling of hardness in 
him against this man Winch, more than against 
any other in the band. Winch knew him better 
than any of the others, and should be able to judge 
him with more justice. It looked as if prejudice 
had made him blind and unreasonable, or that he 
wanted to seize on this pretext of personal affront 
to add one more to his bloody toll of men. 

Texas wondered what Duncan’s purpose in hav¬ 
ing him go with the parleying party might be. He 
thought, with contempt for such smallness and dis¬ 
trust, that it might be to keep him under the eyes 
of Winch, whose name on the range was equal to 


THE TEST 


155 


twenty armed men. It seemed now as if they be¬ 
lieved he had returned to Duncan’s as part of his 
plan to assist his supposed comrades; they did not 
feel it safe to allow him out of sight of their official 
gunner for one minute. 

What a contemptible thing it was to hold a man’s 
word so worthless! He would rather believe the 
tales of five rogues, and lose by his trust, than wound 
one honest man by calling him a liar. But all men 
were not alike, he reflected, looking back over his 
own experiences. Mainly, he had suffered by be¬ 
ing too ready to take men at their word. He would 
have been a good deal richer that morning if he 
hadn’t gone so far on the bare statements of people 
whom he feared to hurt by requiring of them their 
references. 

This he turned in his mind as he went for his 
horse, and came leading it back to where his saddle 
lay. After all, he couldn’t blame Duncan and the 
rest of them. He had no reason for flying up that 
way as he had done with Winch, and challenging 
him to fight. He stood in a bad light, and it was 
a great deal to ask of them that they accept him 
on his unsupported word. 

Things began to clear for him, and the surliness 
began to melt out of his heart. With its going the 
determination to do something to retrieve himself 
burned with a new flame. He would prove his loy- 


156 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


alty to the men who had hired him to guard their 
country if he had to do it by riding single-handed 
and alone against that bunch from Texas. He 
would do it even at the cost of his life, for life was 
a mighty small thing when stripped of its habili¬ 
ments of honor. So he thought as he mounted and 
rode to join Duncan and the others, and set out for 
the top of the hill. 

Duncan rode ahead, carrying a white handker¬ 
chief tied to a sunflower stem. At the crest of the 
hill, half a mile or so from the Texans’ camp, he 
waved it in signal for a parley. In a little while 
three men came riding up the slope. 

The Texans had drawn the wagons of their out¬ 
fit in a circle, making a corral for the horses, after 
the manner of men who were prepared for emergen¬ 
cies, and were ready for a fight. This camp was 
fully a mile in advance of the herd, and in a posi¬ 
tion that would be difficult to take. 

Hartwell looked out over the great herd from the 
hilltop. It was scattered over miles of the range, 
with a rider here and there to hold it in some sem¬ 
blance of form and keep it moving slowly toward 
the north. But it was evident from the position of 
the camp that the southern drovers did not expect 
to advance beyond that point until the question of 
their right had been met and settled. 

Duncan told the delegation from the camp that 


THE TEST 


157 


they must turn back and take the trails set by the 
association. He was calm and moderate in his 
words and manner, and made a good case, it ap¬ 
peared to Texas, no bluster or threat about him at 
all. 

“The stand you Kansas fellers take might be all 
right in case a herd of diseased cattle come into 
your country,” the southern invaders’ leader re¬ 
plied; “but it don’t hold water when it comes to a 
clean herd like this. Them cattle’s as clean as 
any on this range. I’m sorry we can’t oblige you, 
pardner, but we didn’t drive eight hundred miles 
and more to turn back.” 

“It’s unlucky for all concerned that you see it 
that way,” Duncan told him. “We’re going to pro¬ 
tect this range; that’s what we’re here for.” 

“Yes, and we’ve got to ship our cattle, pardner. 
We’ve got our cars ordered, I expect some of them’s 
in there at Cottonwood waitin’ on us now. We’re 
not goin’ to turn back a head of these cattle, and 
we’re not goin’ to pay demurrage on them cars. 
Kansas ain’t bigger than Uncle Sam. He ain’t 
drawed no quarantine line along here and said we 
couldn’t cross it.” 

“We’re plenty big enough to do what we’re here 
to do, my friend.” 

“Well, go on and do it.” The Texan made as 
if the interview was at an end. He started to pull 


158 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


his horse around and ride off. One of his com¬ 
panions restrained him, and Duncan took up the 
argument again. 

“I’m not here to chaw this thing over with you 
and get nowhere,” he said. “We’ve given you 
your marching orders, and you’ll march! We’ve 
got a big bunch of men down here, and more on the 
way, and you’ll turn that herd and start back in¬ 
side of twenty-four hours or you’ll bite lead. Now, 
that’s all there is to it.” 

“I don’t care if you’ve got all hell and half of 
Kansas down here; we’re goin’ on to Cottonwood 
to load our cattle!” 

In spite of his declaration that he wasn’t there 
for argument, Duncan went deeper into the matter, 
still holding himself in hand with admirable con¬ 
trol, it appeared to Hartwell, putting the case to 
the Texans in the light of justice between man and 
man. It was evident that he desired to avoid a 
fight if it could be done, and equally plain that he 
was firm in his intention to enforce the association’s 
quarantine. 

Not until the government drew a line against 
Texas cattle would they observe it, the southerner 
replied, getting hotter every minute as he recounted 
the wrongs, or alleged wrongs, that Texas drovers 
had suffered at the Kansans’ hands. 

“But the way you people look at it there’s nothing 


THE TEST 


159 


wrong in coming in here and poisoning our herds,” 
said Duncan. “Well, boys, I suppose we might as 
well go back.” 

“Here,” Winch called to the Texans who were 
riding away—“this man belongs to your outfit, I 
guess.” 

The Texans turned. “Which?” the spokesman 
asked. 

“This man,” said Winch, pointing to Hartwell— 
“I guess he strayed away from your bunch. Take 
him along with you if you want him.” 

“If that’s a Kansas joke,” said the Texan, in 
marked contempt, “it’s a damn poor brand!” 

They rode on with the bearing of men who be¬ 
lieved some kind of a trick had been attempted on 
them, which was a reflection on their common hu¬ 
man understanding. Now and then one of them 
looked back, face eloquent of the disdain in which 
such clumsy performers were held. 

This denial of Texas by the enemy did not ap¬ 
pear to lift him any higher in the esteem of his 
companions. He believed that Winch had said 
that of him for the mere purpose of adding to his 
humiliation, or in the hope of forcing a fight. 

This he was determined for the present to keep 
clear of. He knew that it would be harder every 
hour to bear the indignities which they would heap 
on him, the insults which they would offer; but he 


160 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


knew also that they would not shoot him in cold 
blood without more proof against him than they 
had. He would bear it until the expiration of 
Duncan’s limit to the Texans, and then when it 
came to the test of turning the herd back across the 
line, he would show them what small-caliber people 
most of them were. 

It came up cloudy again that afternoon, with the 
threat of a rainy night. A misty autumnal drizzle 
began a little before dusk, and through it the Tex¬ 
ans could be seen closing up their scattered herd. 
Hartwell understood this move. It would require 
fewer men to girdle the herd, thus adding to the 
fighting force. The Texans were not going to turn 
back. 

Duncan’s wagon had come up with the supplies, 
and the camp cook had supper in abundance for all 
hands. Texas did not wait for an invitation, but 
presented himself and received his share. He had 
gone without dinner, and this generous hot meal 
was very welcome and cheering. He had caught 
a little sleep during the day, stretched out on his 
slicker, and now felt a whole lot better disposed to¬ 
ward the world, and all in it, even though they did 
not call him into the council that was going on 
around the camp cook’s fire. 

The night fell thickly, with a gentle wind blow¬ 
ing the warm mist. The lowing of the southern 


THE TEST 


161 


herd came faintly, telling of the unrest so charac¬ 
teristic of those beasts, known well to Texas from 
many a long night watch. Winch came to him 
where he stood listening to the long, plaintive calls 
of the cattle, something in them so expressive of 
lonesomeness and longing for their native plains 
that it was almost as moving as a human appeal. 

“Hartwell, we’ve talked over your case, and some 
of them think maybe there’s something to that story 
you told about them fellers ropin’ you. We’re goin’ 
to give you the benefit of the doubt, as the old man 
says.” 

“All right,” said Texas, not able to warm up 
very readily toward Winch, speaking rather crabbed 
and short. 

“We’re goin’ to give you a chance to prove you’re 
square with us and set yourself right, kid. You’re 
a cowman; you know Texas cattle, I guess, better 
than any of us.” 

“I wouldn’t set up any such wide claims, sir.” 

“That herd’s uneasy; you can feel it clear over 
here. It was the same last night—I heard them 
turn the point of a stampede three or four times. 
If you want to square yourself, you go over there 
to-night and stampede that herd toward the line. 
Start ’em tow T ard Texas once and they’ll go at a 
blind lope till they drop. Then you can come back 
—clean.” 


162 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


It was a wild and unreasonable proposal, almost 
mocking, coming from cattlemen. Texas knew 
that the chance a man had of stampeding a herd 
like that was not a thousand in one in his favor, 
and even though he might start a stampede point, 
he would have just as much control over the direc¬ 
tion it might take as a cyclone. He stood consid¬ 
ering it, choking down a hot reply. 

“But I give it to you straight, kid, this ain’t 
throwin’ down the bars to you to lope off yourself. 
If you don’t go out and try to do this job you’ll 
stand convicted in the eyes of every cattleman on 
this range, and it’ll rest between me and you the 
next time we meet.” 

“You might dispense with reference to our fu¬ 
ture meetin’s, sir, if you please,” said Texas haught¬ 
ily. “In most any company I feel I’m able to hold 
up my head, and I’ll not shame your reputation, 
sir, if you ever feel called to sling your gun down 
on me. Let it stand understood between us that- 
away, sir.” 

“I’m not tryin’ to force a fight on you, Hartwell. 
Nothing would suit me better than to see you cleared 
of this. But I’m responsible to the men on this 
range for your bein’ here, and if you fail to do 
what I’m linin’ out for you to-night, you’ll have to 
settle with me. And that’s the last word, Hartwell.” 

“I can stand on my own feet, Mr. Winch, sir; I 


THE TEST 


163 


can carry my own blame, and take the consequences 
for all the wrong I do any livin’ man. It’s a plumb 
fool thing you gentlemen’s set for me to do, but I’m 
just a big enough fool to try it, even if I lose.” 

Texas flung the saddle on his horse, Winch 
standing by making that peculiar little hissing noise 
through his slant teeth. It was as if he tried to 
whistle softly, but the slant of his teeth was too 
sharp to confine the steam. 

“You’d better wait till it’s a little later,” he sug¬ 
gested. 

“It’s my expedition, sir; I’ll start whenever 1 feel 
called on to start.” 

“And come back—when?” 

“In time enough to meet you, sir, any time and 
place you pick.” 

Texas stood a moment with his toe in the stirrup, 
his face turned to Winch as if waiting his arrange¬ 
ment of the next meeting. The little bow-legged 
gun-slinger said nothing; only waved his hand aS 
if passing that along to a future time. 

Hartwell rode away with the headlong sudden¬ 
ness of a bee striking a line for its tree. He was 
so indignant, so thoroughly angry, over the impos¬ 
sible thing they had laid out for him to do that he 
would have fought them all in a bunch. But he 
was reasonable enough to know that it was no state 
of mind for a man to rise up in and meet a great 


164 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


emergency. He must ride that mood out of his 
blood, and consider this thing from all the angles 
that experience had given him. 

Impossible as the cattlemen’s task appeared, it 
would speak better for his honor to attempt it and 
fall at the Texans’ hands than to leave the country 
without having tried it, or return and kill Winch. 
Killing Winch would not vindicate him of the pres¬ 
ent charge. It would only make men a little more 
afraid of him, and perhaps darken the cloud of 
suspicion and distrust that had so unfortunately de¬ 
scended upon him. 


CHAPTER XII 


THE STAMPEDE 

“Co-o-ome all you Texas Rangers 
Wherev-er you may be, 

I’ll tell you of a sto-ry 
That /m^-pen-ed un-to me” 

T HE cowboy was directly ahead of Hartwell 
as he rode through the southern herd, sing¬ 
ing in high, wavering voice to quiet the cat¬ 
tle, which were milling restlessly. Here and there 
the plaintive tenor of a steer’s lowing joined the 
herder’s doleful melody; here and there sounded a 
rush of hoofs as the cattle crowded, huddling to¬ 
gether for comfort in the face of dangers which they 
imagined filled the night. 

Over all the great herd this uneasiness was ap¬ 
parent. There was a sound of shuffling bodies, of 
clashing horns, as the beasts pressed together in 
confusion. The cowboy was going on with his 
song in his endeavor to lull the fear of his charges. 
Texas could picture him, young and slim as his 
voice indicated, riding slowly among the shadowy 
beasts. 

165 


166 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


“Pre-e-e-haps you have a mother, 

A sister fond and true, 

Or maybe-so a dear wife 

To weep and mourn for you.” 

So he carried his song along; that almost inter¬ 
minable song that has been sung by countless cow¬ 
boys from the Rio Grande to the Little Missouri, 
carrying Texas back with it to the days of his own 
boyhood when he had stood many a lonesome watch 
like that. 

Away over to the left of him another high-pitched 
singer could be heard in the long pauses between 
the nearer cowboy’s stanzas. He was too far off 
to catch his words, but Texas could supply them to 
the tune, which came across the night over the sigh¬ 
ing herd as clear as a bugle call. 

“Oh, beat the drum slowly, 

And play the fife lowly, 

And drink to my health as you bear me along—” 

That was the way it began. The ways in which 
it ended were varied, according to locality, tradi¬ 
tion, and the personal taste of the singer. Only in 
all of them they buried him as he longed to be laid 
down, and the wolves howled over him, and the 
snows of winter fell, all in the melancholy cadence 
that was sadder than any dirge when it came on the 


THE STAMPEDE 167 

night wind and the rain from the lips of some singer 
watching beside his straining herd. 

It was plain to the schooled ear of Hartwell that 
the leaven of stampede was working in the dull 
brains of those cattle, evident that it needed but 
some little thing to set them off, as the shifting of 
a rock precipitates the avalanche. But a man on a 
horse was hardly the needed element in their al¬ 
most complete panic, for they were accustomed to 
looking to men on horses for protection, assurance, 
guidance, through all the adventures of the long 
road and the range. A coyote might do it; a bat 
flying in the face of an animal might do it; but it 
was a long chance against a man on a horse. 

Texas was ready and willing enough on his own 
account to make as much trouble for the southern 
drovers, and cause them as much damage as he 
could to balance in some measure the tortures he 
had suffered at their hands. The night favored 
any reprisal that he might be able to devise. It was 
so dark there was no sky-line; the cattle floundering 
up from their uneasy rest in front of his horse, or 
moving aside, almost indifferent to his presence in 
their steaming midst, were indistinct the length of 
his horse’s neck, invisible a few feet away. 

He rode through the herd, keeping the wind in 
his face to hold his direction, for without it he 


168 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


would have been like a cat in a sack. He wanted 
to draw as far away from the singing cowboy as 
possible before starting any commotion among the 
cattle. 

Texas was feeling his way through to find, if pos¬ 
sible, the place where the cattle were most uneasy. 
He could sense this spot in the night as well as in 
the day the moment that he rode into it, for the cat¬ 
tle would be milling like a slow whirlpool. From 
this trampling swirl of cattle a leader would break 
away now and then, followed by others, and start 
off on the aimless run of stampede. This little off- 
throwing from the revolving wheel of the herd was 
called a “point” in the tongue of the range, and it 
was to turn these points back into the herd, and 
confuse and submerge the leaders, that the cowboys 
stood alert on the borders of the drove. If Texas 
could luckily ride into one of these incipient stam¬ 
pedes the cattle could be urged on in spite of the 
herders’ efforts to turn the point. 

Over there, where that young-voiced cowboy was 
singing his long song of the man who left his dear 
wife and numerous relations to go to the thorny 
wastes of the Rio Grande and join the Texas Rang¬ 
ers, the sound of the greatest disquietude came. 
For that spot Texas headed, the rain blowing in his 
face. 

He could not recall ever having ridden in a 


THE STAMPEDE 


169 


darker night. As he rode he felt the pressure 
against his legs of the bodies of cattle which he 
could not see. Great perils would lie ahead of and 
around a man riding blindly with a stampeding 
herd that night. Ordinarily it was a situation of 
aggravated dangers, but in such darkness the risks 
were multiplied many times. The first unseen ra¬ 
vine would be a trap, the first wash across the 
prairie—some of them with banks twenty feet deep 
—would mean a trampled, mangled, smothering 
death. 

But all this had to be faced and dared, for his 
honor’s sake. He was there to stampede that herd, 
or a part of it at least—he had very little hope that 
all of it could be drawn into the flight—and prove 
his loyalty to the men who had put their interests 
into his trust. He could hear the cowboy talking 
to his horse between snatches of his song, and he 
knew that it was an anxious hour for that lone sen¬ 
tinel there in that strange black land. 

Here the cattle were milling in their distracted, 
senseless way, held back by the herder, whose voice 
and presence partly assured them, but could not en¬ 
tirely calm their fears. Texas had difficulty in 
forcing his way among them, his aim being to reach 
the outer edge. 

Suddenly his horse, floundering impatiently 
through the dull stream of beasts, landed almost on 


170 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


top of an animal which, through fatigue or indif¬ 
ference, had lain down in the midst of all the ex¬ 
citement and unrest. The creature came to its feet 
with a snort, giving Hartwell’s horse such a start 
that it reared and squealed. Instantly there came 
a challenge from the cowboy, who could not have 
been, by the distinctness of his voice, more than ten 
rods away. Hartwell bent low to blot himself into 
the blackness of the herd, caution unnecessary, for 
he could not have been seen if he had stood twenty 
feet tall. The commotion caused by riding upon 
the sleeping animal almost precipitated the panic 
that Hartwell hoped to complete. 

The cowboy, whose sharp ears told him that some 
enemy had entered the herd, was coming that way, 
shooting as he advanced. Texas could see him in 
imagination, his horse rearing against the surging 
stream of cattle as if it battled with a flooded river. 
He was shouting his mightiest, a cry high-pitched 
and tremulous, like the howl of a coyote. Others 
were answering him, coming to him, Hartwell knew, 
as fast as they could gallop. 

Hartwell had no intention of discovering himself 
to them by replying to the cowboy’s shots, for he 
was in no danger from that source. He could hear 
the bullets go splitting high over his head, and knew 
very well that the herder would not risk killing his 
own cattle to shoot at a presence only suspected. He 


THE STAMPEDE 


171 


urged his horse forward, and that creature, scorn¬ 
ful of the cattle in his superior wisdom, and out of 
patience with their indifference to its efforts to force 
a passage, bit them in the little charges that it now 
and then had room to make. 

Adding to this stimulation, Texas began beating 
them with his heavy wet hat, careless now about 
keeping his location or his intentions concealed. 
The cowboy was looking for him, cursing and yell¬ 
ing. Near at hand others were whooping and 
shooting, and out of the herd the confused noise of 
clashing horns, hoofs beating the sodden earth, rose 
and grew with every breath. 

There was no longer any lowing, nor that indes¬ 
cribable sad moaning such as they make before 
they lift their voices in the long plaint of homesick¬ 
ness. Panic was among them now; they were 
snorting to be away. Confusion, blackness, the 
scent of rain-wet, steaming beasts; a struggle, a 
scramble of his horse’s feet as if it lunged up a 
steep bank, and Hartwell broke through. His 
horse ran on, unable to check itself under the force 
that it had put into its labor to get clear, and after 
it came the point of the stampede. 

Hartwell heard the sudden change in the slow 
soft trampling of hoofs. It rose suddenly into a 
muffled roar, which grew like flood water, filling 
the night. He rode hard ahead of the stampede, 


172 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


hoping that he could draw off to one side and avoid 
being swept away. All around him he could hear 
the cattle, their horns clashing as they pressed to¬ 
gether with a sound like hail in a field of corn. 

Hartwell had lost his direction. The wind was 
no longer his guide, for he was riding faster than 
any wind except a hurricane. The cattle were bear¬ 
ing him along like a leaf in a freshet. Behind him 
the roar increased as the fury of flight possessed 
them, the pressure of that vast body of charging 
beasts beyond the power of any man to check. If 
his horse should fall, or its endurance prove un¬ 
equal to the flight, they would be crushed together, 
as men and horses had been trampled in stampedes 
of his recollection. 

There was only one thing to do, and that bear 
ahead with the cattle in their furious blind race. 
They were poisoned with the great fear which the 
understanding of man could not compass nor sound. 
The sound of their own flight increased the terror 
which their unreasoning brains had hatched. 
They would run on until their tongues lolled out 
from thirst, their eyes glazed, their heads hung be¬ 
tween their legs. 

That horse of Duncan was a sound-winded ani¬ 
mal. In spite of the strain he held his own with 
the beasts, to which panic had lent speed and en¬ 
durance not ordinarily their own. 


THE STAMPEDE 


173 


It seemed to Hartwell that the stampede lasted 
for hours. Fortunately, the prairie had not yet 
been crossed by a creek or gully, and now the cattle 
were beginning to thin around him, the sound of 
their running to fall away. He checked his horse 
and began to work his way through the straggling 
beasts. Dawn was breaking when he at last rode 
clear of them. Ahead of him was the dark fringe 
of timber along a stream. As far as he could see 
through the breaking darkness the prairie was filled 
with cattle. The fright outrun, these had fallen to 
grazing, or had dropped wearily to rest, the cause 
of their late panic forgotten, if it was ever known. 

Hartwell believed, from the appearance of things, 
that the whole herd had stampeded. It must be 
scattered for miles by now, he knew, for the habit 
of the beasts was to spread as the terror wore out 
of them. The Texans might have weeks of work 
collecting the cattle again to resume the drive. 

He had no idea where he was, and cared little. 
He had accomplished what had seemed the impos¬ 
sible; the herd was stampeded, the sincerity of his 
purpose had been proved. He unsaddled his 
fagged horse, hobbled it, and turned it to graze and 
rest, then threw himself down on the sogged turf 
to sleep, for he was weary to the marrow. The day 
then dawning would have to take care of itself in 
its own way, as it would do anyway, no matter for 


174 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


all the worry that he might expend on it in advance. 

It was the pleasant sensation of the sun feeling 
through his wet garments that woke Hartwell. He 
found himself on a knoll close by the creek, but the 
locality was strange to him. As for that, any lo¬ 
cality in that part of the country would have been 
strange, except the few miles with which he had 
become familiar as he rode the trail. There were 
no cattle very near him now, and nobody in sight. 
He concluded that the Texans had not yet arrived, 
due, very likely, to having followed some other 
branch of their stampeding herd. He did not want 
to meet any of them that morning, either, for they 
would not be in any amicable mood. 

Food was his first thought, for the need of it was 
insistent above all others. He hadn’t a scrap with 
him, and he didn’t know which way to face to find 
a habitation. He knew it would be a safe under¬ 
taking to follow the creek, in either direction. 
Somebody in that country of ranches would be lo¬ 
cated on it, and no matter if the cattle had run clear 
down into the Nation, there would be something for 
a hungry rider. This course he pursued, turning 
toward the east, for that direction lay on his right 
hand, and Hartwell was a right-handed man, mor¬ 
ally as well as physically, and it was the direction 
that suited him best. 

Cattle were spread over miles of country, and at 


THE STAMPEDE 


175 


last he sighted the Texans making some effort to 
gather them up again. But there seemed to be a 
sort of dazed heartlessness in their work, as of men 
stunned by the task that confronted them. Hart¬ 
well found a good deal of satisfaction in that. It 
was something, at least, on account of what he owed 
them for that night of torture in the rawhide rope. 

He kept close to the creek, skirting along in the 
brush. Until midday he followed the stream, 
hardly out of sight of cattle all the way. That herd 
had stampeded to the last animal, he believed, with 
broadening satisfaction. The knowledge of his 
complete success was like the scent of broiling steak. 
It made him sit up in the saddle and feel rather keen 
and eager, in spite of the mauling in body and mind 
which the past three days had given him. 

It began to be impressed on him about that time, 
dimly and not quite understood at first, that he was 
coming into a country where he had been before. 
There was something familiar in the sweep of the 
creek here, something—and there ahead of him, in 
the elbow of the stream as he rose the ridge, was 
Malcolm Duncan’s ranch. 

There it was, as peaceful to behold in the mid¬ 
day sun of that autumn day as a picture in a frame 
upon the wall. Several horses were hitched in 
front, and even at that distance he could tell by the 
way they stood that they had been ridden hard and 


176 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


far. Around him on the prairie, grazing and lying 
about as if it belonged to them, were the Texas cat¬ 
tle, scattered far and wide. 

He had stampeded them, beyond any doubt. But 
he had stampeded them in the wrong direction! 

The humor of the situation struck him first. He 
leaned back in his saddle and almost laughed. 
They had sent him to stampede the herd, with di¬ 
rections that he stampede it toward Texas. He 
wondered how many of them ever had gone out on 
a dark night and stampeded a herd of eight or ten 
thousand half-wild cattle according to directions. 
The wonderful thing, as he saw it, was that he had 
set them off at all. 

But those Kansas drovers would see neither the 
humor nor the marvel of it. That he understood 
very well. What they would say, what they would 
do, he could conjecture without a strain, for there 
was ruin standing in their very doors, delivered by 
his hand. 

Still, his own conscience was easy. He had gone 
about the business honestly, and he had done as 
much as any man among them could have done, 
and more than any one of them would have at¬ 
tempted. He didn’t owe any of them anything, and 
his duty lay straight ahead to report to Malcolm 
Duncan on the result of his night’s work. 

The situation was not without its satisfaction. 


THE STAMPEDE 


177 


Those cattlemen had been quick to jump to his con¬ 
demnation; they had planned this task for him, and 
the work of their own scheming had fallen and 
buried them. He had a sardonic pleasure in the 
anticipation of their various expressions of face 
when they should see him riding up to the corral. 

Hartwell saw that they had recognized him while 
he was half a mile away. They came out of the 
house bareheaded, leaving the dinner-table he sus¬ 
pected, to look at him. Then they ducked in again, 
for their hats and vests and guns. 

This picture of their preparation to receive him 
provoked a smile. A cow-man couldn’t do any¬ 
thing but eat without his vest. He must have it on 
for any serious business, as a Freemason his 
ceremonial-apron. They would come out buttoning 
themselves up in corduroy and duck and velveteen 
in a minute, ready to take him right when he 
arrived. 

But it was a serious matter for him, about as 
serious as a man ever faced, and he knew that, too. 
Yet there was that background of humor in the fact 
that he had stampeded the herd fifteen or twenty 
miles in the very direction that its owners wanted 
it to go, which he could not altogether dismiss. If 
Duncan, or even Dee Winch, could get a glimpse of 
it he would come out of that queer adventure with¬ 
out a fight. 


CHAPTER XIII 


THE CARTEL 

H ARTWELL was spattered with mud from 
foot to eyebrow. Some of it had dried 
and fallen off, some had set only the 
firmer for being dry, leaving him speckled and mot¬ 
tled as by some peculiar disease that infected not 
only the man, but his raiment as well. His beard 
was just long enough to hold the gobs of mud flung 
into his face from the hoofs of the cattle as he made 
that wild ride among them, and if appearances were 
to be taken at face value, Texas Hartwell was a 
desperate man indeed as he rode down to Malcolm 
Duncan’s gate. 

He did not see Winch among the men assembled 
to receive him. Duncan stood to the fore, the sun 
in his iron-gray hair, his sleeves turned up from his 
long, muscular arms, just as he had put down his 
knife and fork. Texas flung himself from the sad¬ 
dle at the corral gate and began to undo his cinch. 
Duncan came over to him, the others stopping off 
a little way, plainly in accord with some pre¬ 
arranged plan. 

“Well, you stampeded ’em,” said Duncan, an air 
178 


THE CARTEL 179 

of constraint about him, as of a man uncertain of 
his way. 

“It looks that way, sir,” Texas replied, still busy 
with his girths. 

Duncan stood silent, watching him as closely as 
if unsaddling a horse was some rare feat, and Hart¬ 
well, an expert, come to demonstrate it. Hartwell 
stripped off the saddle and threw it on the fence. 

“You’d better have spread a sack of poison over 
the grass,” Duncan said. “Well, you stood by 
your friends, you got their cattle into this country, 
anyhow. We’ve got to give you credit for that, 
Hartwell—if that’s your name.” 

Texas unbridled the horse, patted its neck affec¬ 
tionately, turned it into the corral, where it threw 
itself down in the mud and rolled, grunting its sat¬ 
isfaction over its relaxation after its hard night. 

“Gentlemen, Hartwell is my name,” said he, 
“and it’s a name that’s never been disgraced by any 
man that answered to it. I went out last night to 
do the job you laid out for me, not hopin’ to be able 
to put it through, but aimin’ to do my best.” 

The humor that he had seen in the muddle of the 
stampede had all gone out of the situation now. 
These men were earnest in their belief that he was 
one of the southern drovers’ gang, and it was going 
to be something far from a laughing matter to 
change their belief. 


180 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


“I guess you did your best—and your worst,” 
Duncan retorted. 

“I don’t know what argument I can make, sirs, 
to convince you that I’m square with you, and al¬ 
ways have been since the minute I went to work. 
I don’t aim to excuse myself for lettin’ them rope 
me down, yonder, and I’m not goin’ to try. I don’t 
know a man in that outfit by sight, and only one of 
them by his voice. I’m goin’ to look for that man 
and bring him before you. Maybe you’ll take his 
word for it where you hate to take mine.” 

“There wouldn’t be any proof in a thief speaking 
for a thief, Hartwell.” 

Hartwell’s face gorged with blood at the word 
“thief” as if apoplexy had taken him. He drew 
himself up in all the austerity of his lean frame and 
severe face and looked Duncan in the eye with a 
directness that made the big cow-man draw back a 
step. 

“I’d go kind of easy on that word, sir,” Hartwell 
warned him. 

“Yes, I guess I shouldn’t say that,” Duncan re¬ 
flected, with the bearing of a man who wanted to 
be fair. “It’s a man’s business to stand by his 
friends, and I can’t blame you for that. But I do 
blame you, Hartwell, for taking a spy’s advantage 
of us, crawlin’ in the way you did and takin’ that 
job of trail-rider.” 


THE CARTEL 181 

“It came to me before I even started to find it, 
sir.” 

“Well, there’s no use to stand here and chaw 
words over it, Hartwell. It’s done, them Texas 
cattle are in here, and it may take two or three 
weeks to round up our herds and pick them out. 
Maybe they’re clean cattle, maybe they’re not—time 
alone can show that. But crooked or square, you’re 
a bold man, Hartwell, to ride back here and face 
a bunch of men that believe you’ve done them dam¬ 
age beyond calculation.” 

Texas turned from him in his high dignity, out 
of patience with a man of Duncan’s breadth for be¬ 
ing so blind. Even when Hartwell’s strongest plea 
of innocence was on his tongue he was too narrow 
to understand it. A guilty man would not have 
come back; he would have been under no such 
necessity. 

“There’s your horse, and here’s your saddle, Mr. 
Duncan, sir. I’ve got three weeks’ pay cornin’ to 
me, if you can see it that way, sir.” 

“Well, I don’t see it that way! ” 

Duncan spoke harshly, bristling with indigna¬ 
tion. Hartwell heard others remarking on the 
wonder of his gall, and what ought to be handed 
out to him as pay. 

“I reckon I can live without it, sir,” said Texas, 
loftily. 


182 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


“You’re a lucky man that we’re allowin’ you to 
get out of here with your life. They say you 
walked into this country; well, walk out of it, and 
walk fast!” 

“Hold on, Duncan! I’ve got a spoon to put into 
this pot.” 

The speaker came forward, rolling in his gait 
like a bear. He was a man as big as Duncan, but 
with none of his handsomeness, little of his intel¬ 
ligence. His shirt-collar was open on his bristling 
neck, his hat was on his eyebrows, and he was a 
red, raw-mouthed savage out of whom curses came 
pouring like foul water from a drain. He drew 
up before Hartwell, where he stood with his legs 
straddled, looking at him with malevolent contempt. 

“You say you’re on the square with us, and you 
think we’re fools enough to swaller it, don’t you?” 

“I don’t expect anything reasonable or just from 
you at all, sir! ” 

“Yes, and if you was on the square them Texas 
fellers’d ’a’ shot you so full of holes your hide 
wouldn’t ’a’ made shoe-strings! Yes, an’ Winch 
and these fellers knew it when they sent you over 
there on that fool errant. I wasn’t there, I didn’t 
have no hand in it, and I’d ’a’ stood out ag’in’ it till 
hell froze over if I’d ’a’ been! ” 

“Sir, I think I’ll be on my way,” said Texas, 


THE CARTEL 183 

speaking to Duncan, ignoring the blustering cattle¬ 
man entirely. 

“Not till I git through with you, young feller, 
you won’t! An’ maybe you won’t then.” 

“Let him go, Sawyer; we haven’t got proof 
enough against him to hold him,” Duncan said. 

“I got proof enough to satisfy me, Duncan. 
More than any man in this valley I stand to lose by 
them fever ticks you and your damn gang’s sowed 
over my ranch, young feller. Them cattle’s over 
there mixed up with mine, and they’ll all have the 
fever before ten days, and I’ll be cleaned out. Do 
you reckon I’m goin’ to stand by and see the var¬ 
mint that done it sneak off to his hole and me not 
move a hand?” 

“Oh, well, Sawyer, if it’ll do you any good.” 

Duncan indulged him, like a headstrong child. 
The others drew round in a half circle, knowing 
fully what was coming. 

“You stampeded ’em in here, you and them 
other Texas fellers combined—it wasn’t no one- 
man job, and I ain’t fool enough to believe it was. 
I didn’t ketch you doin’ it, and I ain’t got no call, 
’cordin’ to law, to pull out and shoot you in your 
tracks, but if you’ll take off that there gun and 
stand up to me I’ll give you the damndest thumpin’ 
a man ever packed! ” 


184 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


Texas had noticed from the beginning of Saw¬ 
yer’s arraignment that he was not armed. It 
came to him at once that this badgering was an at¬ 
tempt to separate him from his own gun and throw 
him into their hands defenseless. He stood con¬ 
sidering it, Sawyer mistaking his silence for a short¬ 
age on courage. He renewed his insults and de¬ 
fiance. 

“You got a name over in Cottonwood for bein’ 
a fightin’ man, ain’t you? Yes, and you’re a one 
hell of a fightin’ man, ain’t you? Maybe you can 
handle a bunch of them dudes up there, but when 
it comes to men with hair on their backs you’re 
a baby. Yes, an’ if I done right by you I’d take 
a feather piller and bat your brains out and give 
’em to the cat! ” 

Sawyer’s friends laughed. The great savage 
waddled a little nearer Texas, shoving his mean 
face forward. 

“I never seen a man from Texas in my life that 
I couldn’t run out of the country with a ellum 
switch. They ain’t got no fight in ’em lessen they’s 
a bunch of them together. Them’s the kind of fel¬ 
lers that lets the dog lick the clabber off of their 
faces and calls it a shave—they ain’t got the 
stren’th in ’em to raise hair on their faces like a 
man. Yes, and if you don’t take off that dam’ gun 


THE CARTEL 


185 


I’ll pick you up with it on you and hold you out till 
you wiggle yourself to death, you dam’ leather- 
bellied horny rattler!” 

Texas unbelted his gun and handed it to Duncan. 
Then he stepped forward before anybody guessed 
his next move, and slapped Sawyer in the leering, 
red, hairy face. 

Hartwell’s hand was big and hard, and there 
was vigor in the blow, for he gave it for the honor 
of Texas and her men, and the traditions of their 
noble sacrifices and splendid courage. It made the 
cow-man’s teeth pop, and sent him winding up 
against the wall of his comrades. 

Sawyer came at Hartwell with his head down, 
like a bull, his arms reaching to grapple. There 
was no science on either side of that combat, but 
there was a great deal of main strength and awk¬ 
wardness, and a grunting and snorting from Saw¬ 
yer like a grizzly bear. Hartwell avoided his first 
rush and struck him in the face, drawing blood. 

Texas was unloading from his mind and con¬ 
science all the hard things which had grown up in 
him during those days of suspicion and accusation. 
He was fighting not only Sawyer, but the Cattle 
Raisers’ Association, and every blow that he struck 
was for his honor and the lightening of his heart. 
It was better to die fighting than to live disgraced. 


186 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


That thought was uppermost in the whirl of his 
blinding emotions of vindication and vengeance, 
hot anger and desperation. 

He was overmatched by fifty pounds, and Saw¬ 
yer was fighting with the tools which he knew best 
how to use. The one advantage that Hartwell had 
was his shiftiness of foot, which kept him out of 
Sawyer’s rib-crushing arms. Up and down the 
ring of men they surged and slashed, blows falling 
on both sides, blood streaming from faces, from 
gashed knuckles, the rim of onlookers widening and 
contracting to accommodate the fury of the clash. 

As the combat lengthened and the punishment 
that each received increased, their fury grew. 
Caution was no longer a part of either man’s policy. 
They met hand to hand, bent, panted, gasped, drip¬ 
ping blood. Hartwell had got a blow that nearly 
closed his right eye. His face was cut, his nose 
and lips were swollen, his mouth was full of blood. 

He did not know what damage Sawyer had suf¬ 
fered, but it seemed that his fists fell on the cow¬ 
man’s hard body with little effect. Sawyer cursed 
him and insulted him with every vile name that 
was a challenge on the range, and surged at him in 
his roaring charges, at last planting a blow that 
sent Hartwell spinning and stretched him on his 
back. The cowman would have followed up this 


THE CARTEL 


187 


advantage by throwing himself upon his fallen op¬ 
ponent’s body and beating him unconscious as he 
stretched, for that was all included in the grapple- 
and-bite tactics of range encounters. But Duncan 
stretched out his arms and held him back. 

“Have you got enough of it?” Duncan asked, as 
Texas immediately scrambled to his feet. 

Hartwell’s head was whirling, there was a sick- 
ness in the pit of his stomach, such a sickness that 
it seemed to reach every nerve of his body and make 
him weak. He shook himself like a dog coming 
out of the water, and bent his will to overcome this 
sickness which was making his senses dim. 

“No,” he said. 

Duncan stepped from between them. Sawyer, 
reserving his filthiest and most slanderous epithet 
for the last, hurled it at Texas like a handful of 
effluvium. If anything had been needed in excess 
of his unbroken will to brace Texas, this name 
would have served. Instead of waiting for Saw¬ 
yer to charge, Texas sprang and grappled him. 

A new strength was in him, a fresh clearness had 
come over his senses which was as steadying as a 
cool hand on his head. As he had seized the horse 
on the fair grounds at Cottonwood he laid hold of 
Sawyer, unfeeling of his blows and kicks. The 
cowman’s neck cracked as Hartwell closed with 


,188 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


him, bent him backward, lifted him, flung him a 
clean back somersault and left him sprawled sense¬ 
less, his face to the ground. 

A gasp of astonishment, not unblended with ad¬ 
miration, greeted this feat of strength. The on¬ 
lookers stood back from Sawyer as men avoid a 
dead body, no man offering a hand to lift him. 

Hartwell had lost his hat. He looked around 
for it, his head swimming, his forehead throbbing 
as if he had been hammered with a maul. One 
eye was so swollen that he could see through only 
a slit, the other misty from blood that ran into it 
from some injury in his bruised forehead. 

Somebody came forward with the hat and gave 
it to him, silently. Duncan held out the belt with 
the big dangling gun. Hartwell girded himself 
with it again, put on his hat, although it seemed to 
stand ridiculously small on top of the great enlarge¬ 
ment that he imagined his head had undergone, 
faced about, and walked away. He said no word 
to anybody; not one of them said a word to him. 
His way led him past the spot where Sawyer had 
fallen, his face in the mud of the trampled road. 

Hartwell’s after-recollection of the short walk 
from the battle-ground to the creek was as if he had 
risen in delirium from a bed of pain and gone wan¬ 
dering. It seemed a long distance to him, and that 
terrible deep sickness was over him again, as if 


THE CARTEL 189 

from an internal hemorrhage that gorged his vitals 
with blood. 

Instinctively he must have concealed himself in 
the thick willows, for he had no recollection of it 
afterward. But on waking when the day was al¬ 
most spent he found himself there, bruised, cut, 
bloody, and weak. His first thought was that his 
nickname had been the cause of all this misadven¬ 
ture and misery. If he had come into the Kansas 
range as Jim Hartwell, things never would have 
clouded up so suspiciously in men’s minds. The 
pride that he had in that name “Texas” was like all 
vanities, he reflected; a thing to bring its possessor 
soon or late to humiliation and pain. Better to 
have been common Jim, with a whole hide and a 
good report, than picturesque Texas, beaten refugee, 
outcast of his kind, distrusted of men. 

With these bitter reflections he turned his face 
toward Cottonwood, twenty miles away. And it 
was hard walking on Uncle Boley Drumgoole’s 
high heels, a sore road and a long, weary one. It 
was almost noon of the next day when he arrived at 
the Woodbine Hotel, a grim, bruised figure, weak 
and sick. 

A man was sitting on the bench beside the door, 
a cowboy in goatskin chaparejos with the long white 
hair on them. He rose and blocked the door with 
a long arm, an envelope in his hand. 


190 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


“Duncan sent you this,” he said. 

Texas was ashamed of his battered face and 
bloody garments. He turned his back to the cow¬ 
boy as he opened the letter. It contained seventy 
dollars in bills, but no word of writing, nothing at 
all but the money. Seventy dollars was the sum 
due him for his little more than three weeks’ work 
at eighty dollars a month. Duncan had figured 
it liberally, and Texas knew that the big cattleman 
had relented a bit toward him, even to the extent 
of again allowing him the benefit of the doubt. 
There was a little cheer in this reflection. But very 
little. 

“And Dee Winch sent you this,” said the cow¬ 
boy, reaching out his long arm again. 

In the palm of his hand lay a loaded cartridge 
of large caliber. Texas looked from it to the mes¬ 
senger’s face for further information. 

“Winch told me to say to you if you ain’t gone 
out of this country by the time they finish roundin’ 
up them Texas cattle, he’ll make you swaller six 
of these the first time he sets eyes on you.” 

Texas took the cartridge, turned it a moment in 
his fingers, his head bent in his peculiar pose of 
deep concentration. Then he flipped it into the 
street as he had flipped the worthless match. 

“Tell him I’ll be right here.” 


THE CARTEL 


191 


Hartwell’s tone was gently courteous, as if he 
accepted some pleasant engagement. The cowboy 
heard him in wonder, and looked after him with 
strange respect as he entered the office of the green 
hotel. 


CHAPTER XIV 


HARTWELL LISTENS 

O LLIE NOGGLE was clever at reducing 
swellings and easing the pain of abra¬ 
sions, from his long practice at that sub¬ 
sidiary art in a land where violence was the rule. 
After he had gone over Texas Hartwell’s face with 
his razor, and his lumps and bumps, cuts and 
bruises with his lotions and sweet-scented powders, 
there was little trace of damage to be seen. 

That was one advantage of having a bony face, 
he remarked, ingenuously, as he worked on the 
hurts. A man like Hartwell could stand up to a 
lot of pounding and skinning, and get out of Nog- 
gle’s chair just about the same as ever. But every 
barber couldn’t do that for a man, hard face or soft 
face, he allowed. No, sir, it took an artist to make 
a job of it that a man could go to church with and 
not feel ashamed. 

Hartwell owned that it took an artist, indeed, and 
that Mr. Noggle was the premier of his craft. He 
left the shop with confidence, and walked the street 
without shame. He had not ventured to place him¬ 
self in Mr. Noggle’s hands until after dark, for his 

192 


HARTWELL LISTENS 


193 


weakness and sickness had hung on him all after¬ 
noon, in spite of Mrs. Goodloe’s motherly efforts to 
alleviate his suffering and lift the cloud from his 
spirits. 

He told her, openly and without reservation, ex¬ 
actly what he had gone through, and the sincerity 
with which she expressed herself of her belief in his 
honesty was worth more to him than all the physic 
and balm that a medicine chest would hold. 

To add to this comfort Malvina came to his room 
and put her hand on his forehead, and said she 
knew the association men were wrong in the matter, 
and that she would take his part against the whole 
range, just as he had walked into the room where 
the infare supper was going on and taken her part 
against the outrageous claims of Zebedee Smith. 

Hartwell thanked her, and the pain and sickness 
—for a great deal of it was homesickness and lone¬ 
liness—began to grow lighter at once, and the 
beauty to come back to the edges of the world. 
And Mrs. Goodloe brought him chicken broth, and 
sat by him while he drank it, and put a wet towel 
over his eyes, and he fell asleep. It was on her 
recommendation when he woke after sunset that he 
went to the light-handed Mr. Noggle and besought 
his ministrations. 

Sympathy and food, though both of them were 
just the plain, common and wholesome kind with- 


194 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


out spice or garnishment to whet the vanity, brought 
about a quick and brightening change. Texas was 
almost himself when he started to visit Uncle Boley 
after supper, clothed in new raiment, his grand 
black coat coming down on his thighs. As for the 
suspicion of the association, it troubled him little 
now. Duncan’s adjustment of vision after the 
fight lent hope that all of them would see him right 
in time. But there was the challenge from Dee 
Winch, who felt himself aggrieved because he had 
hired Texas into the trust that they thought he had 
betrayed. Winch was not big enough to stand back 
and look at it like the generous man that Texas had 
taken him to be. His mind and sympathy were 
as inelastic as the dried beef upon which he lived, 
and his heart was atrophied like a chunk of it hang¬ 
ing in the smoke. His threat haunted Hartwell 
like a whisper in his ears. It would not leave him; 
he was conscious of it every breath. 

He found that the story of his supposed treason 
had gone to Uncle Boley’s shop ahead of him, and 
all over the town, in fact. 

“Yes, they’re cussin’ you high and low, Texas, 
wherever they’re got interest in cattle, one way or 
another, for this is a cow town, as I told you be¬ 
fore,” the old man said. 

Uncle Boley sat looking out of his window—he 
was at work on a special rush job when Texas en- 


HARTWELL LISTENS 195 

tered—his waxed end hanging down his beard, his 
attention off the boot in the strap. 

Texas thought that he avoided him with his eyes, 
and felt the hurt of that distrust more than he had 
suffered from Sawyer’s fists. He believed the old 
man was going to repudiate him, afraid of the cat¬ 
tlemen’s censure for having been his sponsor in a 
way. He could not blame Uncle Boley for that. 
Above all the others he had a reason—the reason 
of his butter and bread, his bed, his humble roof. 
If they should take their patronage away from him, 
all would fail. 

“But let ’em cuss and be damned—I’ll stand by 
you!” said Uncle Boley, with great and sudden 
vehemence. He whacked the bench with his ham¬ 
mer, a flush of defiance in his face, the light of a 
fight in his eyes. 

Texas was taken around so suddenly by this dec¬ 
laration that he had no wind for a moment. And 
then when his wind came back, he hadn’t any 
words, he was so chocked up with the big feeling 
of gratitude and admiration which rose up in him 
for this brave, honest old man. He went around 
the end of the little counter and gave Uncle Boley 
his hand, and looked him in the eye what men do 
not say to each other in times like that. 

“That’s all right, gol dern ’em!” said Uncle 
Boley. “I knew some of them fellers when they 


196 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


was stealin’ calves, and I can tell more’n one of 
’em how they got their start. Let ’em come to me, 
gol dern ’em, and I’ll put a cuckle burr under their 
tails that’ll make them twist forty ways a minute!” 

Texas was moved the deeper by this expression 
of faith and loyalty because it had come from Uncle 
Boley’s tongue before he had heard Hartwell’s side 
of it. Now he sat down near his ancient friend as 
he plied his thread, and told of his adventures with 
the invading cattlemen, sparing nothing, not even 
the visit of Fannie Goodnight to the border, and 
her part in his capture and disgrace. He believed 
that it was due to Uncle Boley to know all this, 
even though the figuring of Fannie Goodnight in 
it might place him in a more unenviable situation. 
Uncle Boley worked on in silence a little while, ac¬ 
cording to his way when pondering a heavy mat¬ 
ter. Then: 

“Do you reckon that girl was on the square, 
Texas?” 

“I think she was, sir.” 

“But you know how a woman can act up, Texas. 
She can throw it all over a man when it comes to 
actin’ up. But that feller a cussin’ her seems to 
carry out her word that she tried to tip it off to you 
and spoke too late.” 

“I’ve turned it in my mind from all sides, Uncle 


HARTWELL LISTENS 


197 


Boley, and I’m of the belief that she tried to do 
the square thing after she got to thinkin’ it over, 
but spoke too late, sir, as you say.” 

He said nothing about Fannie’s earnest declara¬ 
tion of the length she would go for him, nor of the 
liking that she had so openly expressed. No mat¬ 
ter what she was, or had been in her day, she was 
sincere when she told him that, her hand on his 
arm, her eyes and voice as earnest as a woman’s 
ever were. 

No matter what she was, or had been in her day, 
indeed, there was an untainted spot in the core of 
her heart, and an upreaching and a yearning to 
have better than the world had given her, or her 
own wilful choice had brought. That much would 
keep between Fannie Goodnight and him. He 
asked Uncle Boley to hold her name out of it, as 
a mark of gratitude. The old man readily saw it 
in that light, and assented. 

“We’ll set our pegs and see how things turn out,” 
Uncle Boley said. “If Duncan’s beginnin’ to see 
through a chink, that’s a good sign he’s cornin’ 
around to your side. Winch—he’ll be the hardest 
snag in the road. You can’t argue with that man. 
If you meet him, Texas, don’t wait the bat of your 
eye—let him have it, right in the gizzard. Yes, 
and if I have to take a hand I’ll take it, by granger! 


198 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


I’ve been a good friend to Dee, and I’ve stood by 
him, but I ain’t a goin’ to set around and see him 
sling no gun on you.” 

“I don’t want to have any more brawls and dis¬ 
turbances while I’m here, either, but I can’t run 
away from that little man. And I ain’t got any 
particular business right around here any more, 
Uncle Boley, but I couldn’t look at even myself in 
the glass if I was to let him drive me off thataway.” 

“You ain’t got no business around here, heh?” 
Uncle Boley spoke almost derisively, he put so 
much force into his words. He pulled at his 
threads as if he was out of humor with the boot, and 
wanted to hurt it. “Well, Sallie McCoy she’s 
stopped in here every blessed day since she come 
back from Duncan’s askin’ me if I got any word 
from you. Nothing to stay around for, heh? 
Well, if I had half that much to stay around for 
anywhere, they couldn’t drive me out of the country 
with dogs.” 

“I’m proud to know she took such a kindly inter- 
ust in a stranger, sir. Do you suppose she’ll think 
I’m a crook when she hears about this?” 

“It takes more than rumors and suspicions to 
turn Sallie McCoy agin a friend.” 

“But I’m scarcely so near to her as a friend, sir. 
An acquaintance, a man passed by in the big road; 
that is all, sir.” 


HARTWELL LISTENS 199 

“Of course, if you don’t want to be no more than 
that! ” 

“I do want to be more than that, I’m pinin’ and 
pindlin’ away to be more than that, Uncle Boley, 
sir. But I couldn’t approach her under any false 
pretenses, or under present unfortunate condi¬ 
tions. I’m a footless wayfarer, Uncle Boley; I 
have no place to lay my head. Here to-day, away 
to-morrow, like a bird on the wing, a pore old ornery 
crow-bird, sir, that’s sailed off by the wind ever’ 
whichway, and no place to light at all, and call it 
home.” 

“Then it’s time you was makin’ a home, and 
puttin’ somebody in it to look after it, by granger! 
It makes me mad to hear a young feller with the 
daylight of his life ahead of him growlin’ about 
havin’ no place to light. What does a man need 
but a woman, and what does a woman need but a 
man?” 

Uncle Boley’s exposition of the simplicity of life 
drew that glimmering smile into Hartwell’s eyes, 
and broke the stern corners of his mouth. 

“Well sir, a house to live in, and something to 
eat, I reckon, ahead of most everything else,” he 
ventured to reply. 

“He’d be a dam’ pore stick of furniture if he 
couldn’t git ’em!” 

“And I suppose there’d be a fire needed to keep 


200 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


them warm, and coal-oil for the lamp/’ pursued 
Texas, his smile broadening until a little glint of 
his marvelously white teeth could be seen. 

“Yes, and if he had a pair of eyes like Sallie 
McCoy’s aside of him he’d have a light to cheer him 
through the darkest night that ever set, and he’d 
have a fire in her heart that’d warm him if death 
was a standin’ over agin the wall. Tell me!” 

“He would, sir,” said Texas, very softly, his eyes 
fixed as one who saw a vision, “he would so, as sure 
as you’re born!” 

“Then why in the dickens don’t you take her?” 

“Why, she wouldn’t have me, sir—she wouldn’t 
begin to have me!” 

Texas reduced himself, and emphasized his un¬ 
worthiness so sharply that he seemed nothing but 
a point. 

“How do you know?” 

“She’s a noblewoman, sir, one of the Almighty’s 
royalty! The ground she walks on—” 

“Is like any other ground—muddy or dry, 
’cordin’ to the weather. All you got to do, Texas, 
is spraddle out and throw a ham into it, like you’re 
able if you set your jaw to a thing. Take a holt 
of something in this town that’ll make you money 
—you don’t have to wait till you get a gripsack full 
of it to ask Sallie to have you; she’s the kind that’d 
be a help to any man.” 


HARTWELL LISTENS 


201 


“I’m most certain she would, sir. But a man 
couldn’t ask her to meet greater hardships than 
she’d leave at home, maybe. And I’d be as keen 
as a bee in the early mornin’ to start up in some¬ 
thing here, Uncle Boley, if I knew what to turn to 
and had the means.” 

“Can you run a drug store?” 

“I don’t even know what it is they keep in ’em 
that makes that purty smell, sir.” 

“H-m; that’s too bad. I knowed a feller run 
a drug store down in Kansas City, and he cleared 
more than he took in. It’s the finest business a 
man ever opened, if he knows how to run it. I 
don’t reckon you was brought up to doctorin’ or 
lawyerin’, was you Texas?” 

“No sir, I wasn’t, it grieves me to say, Uncle 
Boley.” 

Uncle Boley sewed on until he had used up his 
thread, then he took the boot out of the strap and 
stood it on the floor with reflective preoccupation. 
He was silent a good while, Texas watching him 
with the candle of humor in his eyes, his face soft¬ 
ened in its homely austerity by the affection that he 
held for this simple, garrulous old soul. 

“Well, I’ll think out something for you, son,” 
Uncle Boley said at last. “You go on ahead and 
fix that part of it up with Sallie, and by the time 
you’re ready I’ll have some plan figgered out if you 


202 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


don’t hit on one you like better yourself. Maybe 
we’ll make it a double weddin’.” 

Uncle Boley winked, in his quick and devilish 
way, and jerked his head triumphantly in the man¬ 
ner of a man who knows that he is uncovering an 
astonishing surprise. 

“You don’t tell me! I congratulate you, sir, 
and I doubly congratulate the lady, whoever she 
may be.” 

Uncle Boley’s face wore a cast of high impor¬ 
tance as he went to his little counter and opened the 
drawer. He took from it a photograph, which he 
passed to Texas. 

“She’s cornin’ down from Topeky in a week or 
two. She wants to see how fur I can jump.” 

The picture was of a woman past her prime, a 
long-necked woman, thin of features, ringlets of 
heavy hair on her shoulders. She was gaily 
dressed, in a vogue long past, with tight sleeves and 
little upstanding pokes on the shoulders. There 
were a good many flowers about her, and much 
jewelry. Her eyes were hollow, her cheeks sad, as 
if she had wept the passing of many men. 

The photograph was old, and Texas knew it at 
once for one of those curios which came from the 
tents of traveling photographers when the art was 
in the infancy of the dry plate. 


HARTWELL LISTENS 203 

“This is the lady you mentioned to me one time, 
sir?” 

Texas wanted to show interest, a polite, if not 
a deep interest, although the humor of Uncle 
Boley’s romance was one of the hardest things to 
bear that he ever had met. 

“That’s Gertie Moorehead,” Uncle Boley said, 
very proud of her, and very proud of himself for 
getting on the road of winning her to his hoary 
bosom. 

“I wish you much joy,” said Texas, in the quaint 
words of congratulation with which they still greet 
bridal people in certain remote corners of this wide 
land. 

'“She’ll be down,” Uncle Boley took the picture, 
held if off at arm’s length, studied it with romantic 
softness in his eyes, “to look me over and talk it up 
between us. If she’s suited, we’ll hitch. It never 
was good for a man to be alone, and it never will 
be. The longer he’s alone the worse it gits.” 

“Yes, sir, I guess it must, sir.” 

“I can take care of a woman, I ain’t none of your 
old used-up stiffs. I’m a better man than many a 
one of forty-seven I could step out of that door and 
lay my hands on! ” 

“Yes, and a sight better than some of them at 
thirty- seven, I’ll bet you a purty, sir.” 


204 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


“Well, I ain’t crowin’ over nobody in petic’lar, 
but I’ve took care of myself. You’ll be stayin’ 
down at Malvina’s, will you?” 

“I’ve sent word to Mr. Winch that I’m to be 
found there.” 

Uncle Boley’s manner of assurance and spright¬ 
liness fell from him at the mention of Winch. He 
became at once serious and silent, as if the over¬ 
hanging threat pressed upon his heart. 

“Yes, and if he gits you, Texas, I’ll stoop down 
and I’ll pick up your gun, and I’ll foiler him to the 
rim of daylight but what I put a bullet in his 
heart!” 

Texas lifted his head with a new feeling of pride, 
and looked the old man straight in the bright, blue 
eyes. 

“It means a great deal to a man to have a friend 
who will go that far for him, Uncle Boley, sir!” 

Texas went away from Uncle Boley’s shop feel¬ 
ing unaccountably lonely in spite of the evidence 
of confidence and affection that the old man had 
shown. He could not put the shadow of Dee 
Winch’s threat against his life out of his mind. 
More than once in the passage between shop and 
hotel he caught himself unconsciously watching 
from side to side, unconsciously straining for the 
sound of a footstep behind him. 

It was a disquieting thing to live with a sentence 


HARTWELL LISTENS 205 

of death hanging over one’s head that way. He 
was free to walk in the light or the dark with other 
men, and to pursue the business of his life in the 
accustomed trend, but he could not be free from the 
heavy dread of the sudden meeting, the flash of 
arms, somebody reeling in the road, his gun 
dropped at his feet. That was a demand note 
which Dee Winch had taken from him; it must be 
paid upon presentation. 

Even in his room he could not find the relaxa¬ 
tion that is due a man without an uncommon care. 
This thing hung over him, placed him in a vacuum, 
it seemed, through which the sound of other men’s 
activities came but dimly, and as of things sec¬ 
ondary to his own important strait. 

It had come between him and all his planning, 
it stood in the foreground cutting off all view an 
arm’s length beyond. Over his spirits it was as 
heavy as a debasing drug; in his thoughts it ob¬ 
truded constantly, like the nagging tone of a hate¬ 
ful voice. The alertness of the hunted was in every 
nerve; caution had become exaggerated into a pain. 
There could be no rest, there could be no moment 
of relaxation for his strained faculties until this 
thing had been met and finished. 

Hartwell had become a listening man. 


CHAPTER XV 


THE BANJO NOTE 

H ARTWELL was not without offers of em¬ 
ployment next day. Malvina wanted to 
put him in as night clerk in her office, a 
place created out of her generosity for the sole 
purpose of offering it to him. Not that a night 
clerk was not needed in the Woodbine Hotel, in¬ 
deed, for people came in at all hours, many of them 
boisterous, more of them sullen and red-eyed and 
mean from liquor and losses at the gambling joints. 

But Texas refused it with grateful expressions, 
only to be waited on a little while later by Jud 
Springer, the gambler whose house had been closed 
by the mayor’s one-sided application of his own law. 
Springer had come back with three quick-handed 
friends behind him, and was planning to reopen his 
place that night. He wanted to put Texas in as 
chief of his squad, and offered big inducements in 
in the remunerative way. 

This offer Texas also was obliged to put behind 
him, with such modest discount of his competency 
as to lift him to the pinnacle of the gambler’s re¬ 
spect. He had no intention of taking sides with 
206 


207 


THE BANJO NOTE 

any faction in Cottonwood, nor of arranging him¬ 
self against the law, farcical as it might be. 

It was a question with him what to do, indeed. 
His money would soon waste away, even at the very 
moderate rate for lodging and board which Mal¬ 
vina had made in his case. Something would have 
to be set going shortly. 

He could not leave there to seek employment, for 
he had passed his word to Winch. That appoint¬ 
ment was an obligation. To run away from it 
would be equal to the repudiation of debt. It 
would follow a man, and cling to him like a taint; 
he never could lift up his head in honorable com¬ 
pany again. 

So there he would stay until Dee Winch came, 
and this matter was finished for all time. There 
would be no other way of easing the strain of lis¬ 
tening, as wearing on a man to bear as a contracted 
muscle for which there was no relief. One way 
or another their meeting in the streets of Cotton¬ 
wood would end this thing. 

He was resentful in his mental attitude toward 
Winch. A man had no right arbitrarily to throw 
another under the necessity of defending his life 
on any such groundless pretext. It appeared to 
him that it was a forced excuse for Winch to ease 
for another week or month the blood thirst that had 
fallen on him like some unholy disease. He did 


208 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


not want to kill Winch; in his heart there was not 
one shadow against the man that would justify the 
thought. But he was determined fully to act ac¬ 
cording to Uncle Boley’s advice. If Winch should 
beat him to his gun when they met, he would have 
to move faster than a snake. 

It was late in the afternoon of the day after his 
arrival at Cottonwood from the range that Hart¬ 
well met Sallie McCoy at Uncle Boley’s shop. 
She was just leaving; the old man had quit his 
bench to attend her with ceremonious courtesy to 
the door. 

“Talk of the devil!” said Uncle Boley. 

“Oh, Uncle Boley!” she protested, while a warm, 
soft flush drowned her face, and a smile leaped 
in her eyes like the fire of a home-hearth as she gave 
Hartwell her hand. 

“I mighty proud to see you, Miss McCoy.” 

Hartwell bent over her hand in his quaint, old 
cavalier way. He was not wearing his long coat 
that day; the great heavy revolver that Ed McCoy 
had carried to his death hung on his thigh like a 
sword. 

“Well, if he ain’t the devil he’s blood related to 
him, accordin’ to these cow-men around here,” 
Uncle Boley said. 

“You surely would think so, sir.” 

“Not all of us—even cow-men,” she assured him, 


THE BANJO NOTE 209 

laving him for a moment in the cool of her clear 
brown eyes. 

“You are a host on my side, Miss McCoy.” 

“Yes, and you’re a stoppin’ my door up so the 
air can’t blow in on me,” Uncle Boley complained, 
with a great comical exaggeration of injury and 
pretense of suffocation. “Git out of here and do 
your talkin’ and passin’ compliments, you two 
young sky-looters! ” 

He shooed them out like chickens, chuckling in 
his beard, and watched them as they went off to¬ 
gether in the slant sunlight of the autumn day. 

Sallie was on her way to gather goldenrod, she 
said, to adorn her room at school. It grew abund¬ 
antly by the roadside everywhere, but it was better 
just out of town, away from the dust of wheels and 
hoofs. Yes, he might go if he wished; he would 
be useful to help carry it, for she meant to gather a 
great deal, oh, an immense amount of it, indeed. 

The world was full of gold that day, of black- 
eyed Susans wearing bonnets of it, of sunflowers 
blooming late, destined to fall before the frost, and 
goldenrod in banks and wide stretches over the wild 
meadowlands. For it is the way of nature on the 
Kansas plains to send springtime white-garlanded, 
like a bride, and autumn splendid in a golden cope, 
like a luxurious bishop come to give benediction on 
the summer labors of men. 


210 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


They worked like gleaners in the ancient fields, 
freighting themselves with flowers, and what the 
moonlight had begun that night when they sat un¬ 
der the cottonwood at Duncan’s ranch, the gold of 
this autumn evening brought to completion and 
welded so fast into his heart that Texas knew it 
never could come away. He must prepare the 
ways of life thenceforward for two; the road lead¬ 
ing away from Cottonwood seemed so remote that 
his feet never would find it any more. 

There was a great deal to be said, a good many 
sighs to be spent on both sides, about the business 
of gathering two armfuls of goldenrod, it seemed. 
Perhaps hearts out of which sentiment had dried, 
such as florists’ hearts, would not have found it a 
long task nor a particular one in that field of 
abundant bloom, but it was nearing sundown when 
Sallie and Hartwell turned their faces again toward 
the town. The schoolhouse was on the way to Sal- 
lie’s home, and there they were to leave the flow¬ 
ers. Early in the morning she would go and ar¬ 
range them along the bleak walls of her room. 

Never before in his life had Texas Hartwell 
gone carrying a sheaf of yellow flowers beside a 
lady. It was a rare day, indeed, an occasion of 
great pride. Children came smiling to greet their 
teacher, little girls skipped beside her, turning up 


211 


THE BANJO NOTE 

adoring eyes. There was room for all of them in 
her heart, along with him, Hartwell knew; room in¬ 
deed for the whole world without crowding him and 
causing him one jealous pain. 

“There’s Mr. Stroud,” said Sallie, as they ap¬ 
proached the schoolhouse, “the principal of our 
school—my boss. I’d like you to meet him.” 

“I’ll be proud to,” Texas declared. 

Stroud was locking the front door of the white- 
painted, churchlike building in which he presided 
over the mental discipline of Cottonwood’s youth. 
Hartwell saw that he was a tall, harsh-jointed man, 
surly of look, ram-faced, a dusting of white in his 
heavy, rough black hair. He looked around at 
them as he put the key in his pocket, a frown on 
his sour face, turned, and hurried off the other way, 
giving Sallie no chance to present her friend. 

“He doesn’t seem to be inclined to make my ac¬ 
quaintance, Miss Sallie,” said Hartwell, feeling the 
cut deeply. 

“Mr. Stroud is a peculiar man,” she excused, 
flushing in humiliation for the necessity of making 
apology for the schoolmaster’s boorish behavior. 

“It galls a man to be in public disfavor to the 
depth that I have fallen, Miss Sallie; it hurts like 
saw-grass on the naked skin.” 

“I know it does, Mr. Hartwell, but as long as 


212 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


—some of us believe in you, and your conscience 
is clear, you can hold your head up in spite of their 
prejudice.” 

“As long as you believe in me, Miss Sallie, I can 
feel the clouds scrape my hair.” 

He waited outside while she unlocked the door 
and left her burden of blooms in her room, and 
not until he had parted from her at her own gate 
was he conscious again of the listening strain for 
the unheard footfall at his back. That phantom 
had left him for a little while in what seemed to 
him her holy presence. Now it had returned in 
aggravation, as if to impress upon him the fatuity 
of planning any felicitous thing for his future days. 

There could be no peace, there could be no plan¬ 
ning, indeed, until the day of reckoning between 
him and Dee Winch. Until that day he must walk 
with his life in pawn, with no right to love and 
inspire love, no right to plan and build and hope 
like other men. With his faculties centered on the 
invisible thing behind him, ready to wheel and fire 
at the first sound of that threatening step, he must 
walk the earth a listening man. 

Moodily he walked the streets after supper that 
evening, turning in his mind many things. His 
heart urged him to the presence of Sallie McCoy, 
where he knew he should find welcome and the 
comfort of faith, but his honor held him back. 


213 


THE BANJO NOTE 

Crowds which seemed to have sprung from the 
ground like grasshoppers were out, the din of the 
musicians in the two rival dance halls was shriek¬ 
ing into the night. All was animation, with the 
flush of the night’s first potations on the cheeks of 
men who would grow ugly and quarrelsome as the 
accumulated poison struck deeper and the polluted 
night wore on. 

Texas wondered how many men among them 
walked with their trailing shadows like him on the 
streets of Cottonwood that night. Many were there 
who had taken human life, against whom accounts 
remained to be balanced by law or kindred or 
friend. And there was growing at that hour trou¬ 
ble which probably would result in more shooting 
and slaying before many days. 

Jud Springer had defied the mayor and opened 
his place, with an imported band which, in volume 
of sound at least, was ahead of anything that Cot¬ 
tonwood had ever heard. Business was going to 
his doors, for the lights were bright, and the shoul¬ 
ders of women gleamed under them like insidious 
flowers. 

Hartwell wondered what had become of Fannie 
Goodnight, the glimpse of those half-naked women 
having brought her sharply into his mind. There 
must have been a good deal of that kind of life in 
Fannie Goodnight’s experience, he believed, for the 


214 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


sight of those women immediately to suggest her. 
Whether she had put it behind her and opened a 
new account, of course he did not know. One way 
or another she seemed to have put something be¬ 
tween her and her past, or the worst of her past. 

He felt that he owed Fannie a friendly turn if it 
ever should come his way to pay it, for he was con¬ 
vinced that the good in her had moved her to warn 
him that night at the peril of hard usage for her¬ 
self. He doubted if they should ever meet again, 
for it was likely that those who had used her to 
entrap him had sent her away from that country, 
distrustful of her for any future employment in 
their schemes. 

Mrs. Goodloe was in the hotel office knitting a 
necktie of scarlet silk when he returned from his 
aimless rambling. She held the finished portion 
of it up to Hartwell’s view and admiration. 

“It’s for Ollie’s birthday,” she said. “Do you 
think it’ll become him?” 

“It will make him look like a prince, ma’am,” he 
assured her, with entire gravity. 

Mentally he pictured the flaming adornment over 
Mr. Noggle’s pea-green shirt, beneath his salmon¬ 
like, shallow chin. He surely would be a figure 
to fascinate the female eye when he stepped out ar¬ 
rayed in that ardent example of his mother-in-law’s 
art. 


215 


THE BANJO NOTE 

“Ollie’s a good boy, he treats Malvina like a 
perfect lady. She never knew what it was to have 
a man that’d take his hat off to her when he meets 
her in the street, just like she didn’t belong to him, 
till she married Mr. Noggle.” 

Mrs. Goodloe was so touched by the courteous 
behavior of the barber that her voice shook with 
tenderness. Texas understood very well what such 
consideration meant to women whose lives had been 
as barren as Mrs. Goodloe’s and Malvina’s. His 
respect for the barber rose a little, in spite of his 
trade. 

“Mr. Noggle is a gentleman, ma’am. Any man 
could tell that the minute he met him in the road.” 

“Yes, he is, Mr. Hartwell. He ain’t much of a 
man for a fight, I don’t reckon, till he’s crowded 
to it, but all men ain’t alike that way. You take 
Zeb Smith; he was always ready to knock some¬ 
body down, specially his wife. He never laid a 
hand on me, though, the ornery old houn’! ” 

“I’ll just bet you a purty he never, ma’am!” 

“No, and if he had I’d ’a’ scalded him to the 
bone! I’d ’a’ put a spider in his coffee if he’d ’a’ 
been my old man, long before he ever took that 
cowardly sneak off to the Nation.” 

“He sure deserved two of ’em, ma’am. That 
man’s got a breachy eye.” 

“He’s as sneaky as a snake.” 


216 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


“Til bet a purty he is.” 

“If you had all the horses together that man’s 
stole they’d load a car.” 

“You don’t tell me!” 

“Yes, and cattle, too.” 

“Cattle, ma’am!” 

“Millions of ’em. If he got a year for ever’ one 
of ’em he’d be in the pen when Gabr’l blows his 
horn. Did you know he come sneaking around 
here as soon as he heard you’d left?” 

“No ma’am, I didn’t hear of it. Did he do any 
damage?” 

“He didn’t come here to the house, but he’s back 
in town, workin’ for Johnnie Mackey.” 

“What might that old scoun’rel be doin’ for 
Mackey, ma’am?” 

“Bouncerin’. He goes on at ten or ’leven and 
works till the crowds clear out. They don’t know 
him very well here now, for this was only a new 
starter of a town when he left, and most of them 
fellers has come in since. He looks fierce, and he’s 
mean. I guess he’ll hold the job. Zeb’s trick is 
to hit a man when he ain’t expectin’ it and lay him 
out—that’s his way.” 

“He sure is a mean-lookin’ man, ma’am.” 

“Yes, and Ollie’s so nervous over him bein’ in 
town he don’t hardly dare to go to and from the 
shop. He’s been thinkin’ of movin’ down here to 


THE BANJO NOTE 217 

the ,hotel, but it wouldn’t be as good. He’d lose 
trade by it, for he’s centered where he is, and I tell 
him to buckle a gun on him and stick to it.” 

“That’s the right advice, ma’am.” 

But advice which would profit Ollie Noggle noth¬ 
ing, and Texas knew it very well. He could imag¬ 
ine the barber’s discomfort with that old sandstone 
savage hanging in the background like a threat. 

“I and Malvina—we was just a talkin’ a little 
while ago and sayin’ that it would be a good thing 
for Ollie if him and you was to go pardners in the 
shop.” 

“Me, ma’am? Why, I never barbered nothin’ 
in my life but a mule! ” 

“Not to do barberin’, I don’t mean, but just to 
kind of stay around and draw the line for Smith, 
and walk to and from the shop with Ollie.” 

“I can do that without bein’ a pardner, ma’am, 
if it would help Ollie any, and I’d be proud.” 

“It would—it’d be the biggest help a man ever 
give another. That poor boy’s up there at the shop 
right now, late as it is, waitin’ for me or Malvina to 
come after him, and I’ll bet he’s sweatin’ and 
trimblin’ in every limb. Malvina’s afraid to go 
over after him alone for fear of runnin’ acrost Zeb, 
and both of us can’t leave here. If this keeps on 
I’ll load up a gun and drive that scalawag away 
from here myself! ” 


218 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


“I’ll go right up to the shop, ma’am, and fetch 
him home.” 

Texas had to hurry out of her presence, her vol¬ 
ley of thanks at his back for the provocation of 
laughter was greater that minute than at any time 
since he came to Cottonwood. In his imagination 
he could see Noggle’s long narrow face at the door 
of his little shop, the sweat of his anxiety like the 
distillation of his precious ambergris on his brow. 

It was a terrible thing for a man to be a coward 
like that, especially when the subject of his aversion 
Was so unworthy as Zeb Smith. Still, it was a pity 
that Smith, the old ruffian, should be allowed to 
give the simple-hearted Malvina so much distress. 
The old rooster ought to be run out of town, and 
Texas had half a mind to go to him and serve no¬ 
tice. But that would be putting himself up before 
the public in the light of a bad man, and it was a 
distinction that he did not court. 

Noggle was a greatly relieved man when Texas 
stepped into his shop. He was so grateful that he 
capered about in light little prancings for his hat, 
his seersucker coat, his umbrella, and his gloves. 
Noggle never appeared on the street, by night or by 
day, without his gloves, if not on his hands, then 
held elegantly in one of them as if he had just taken 
them off. 


219 


THE BANJO NOTE 

Now, as he walked beside Texas, turning fearful 
glances this way and that for the terrible form of 
Zeb Smith, he made a very fashionable figure in¬ 
deed, for all his fear. His hat was small and soft, 
of a dove-gray, pinched together at the crown like 
a tomato can that had been run over by a wagon 
wheel. It sat high on his curly hair, a little to 
one side, leaving free an abundant fluffy lock of 
that adornment to fall upon his left eyebrow. His 
trousers were light, and tight on his long, thin legs; 
perfume floated after him; his very presence pro¬ 
claimed his trade. 

In a little while he put aside his fear, for he was 
as simple in his trust as he was poor in valor, and 
walked beside Texas with the confidence of a child 
whose mother has come to convoy it home from 
school through the perils of street barbarians. 
Their way led past Johnnie Mackey’s wide-open 
door. There was no other route to the hotel, ex¬ 
cept one that would have been roundabout, dark, 
and undignified to follow. Noggle seemed to have 
a sort of desperate satisfaction in passing the lair 
of his enemy. 

Zeb Smith was standing in the door. Noggle 
did not see him among all who came and went 
through that gaping portal until it was too late to 
draw back, although Texas had picked him out 


220 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


from afar. He must have looked as big as a church 
steeple to the barber, whose eyes began to grow as 
his jaw fell and his breath came short. 

“There he is, there he is!” he whispered, shrink¬ 
ing behind his conductor. “You got your gun? 
Yes, oh, yes—you got it!” 

Noggle sighed in the assurance and relief that the 
sight of the gun gave him, and Texas took him by 
the arm with firm grasp to hold him abreast and 
marched him so close up to Zeb Smith he could 
smell him. Smith came out to the sidewalk and 
glared fiercely on them as they passed under the 
bright lights. 

“Huh! hired a nurse!” he scoffed. 

Texas felt Noggle’s flesh tremble under the sound 
of the rough taunting voice. Noggle could not 
have framed a word if his life depended on it, for 
his tongue was frozen against his teeth with fear, 
but Texas let go of his arm, turned and gave 
Smith a look that drove him like a kicked dog to 
the shelter of his door. His cur’s courage returned 
to him there; he stood calling insults after them 
which drew laughter from the loungers at hand. 

When they turned the corner the barber’s breath 
began to go down as far as his first vest button 
again. He drew out his perfumed handkerchief 
from his breast pocket—where a corner of it was 
always displayed in the refinement of fashion and 


221 


THE BANJO NOTE 

the elegance of taste of which Noggle was the great 
exemplar—and wiped away the sweat of his agon¬ 
izing fear. 

“That feller’ll go too fur one of these days!” he 
said. 

“I think he’s gone too far already,” Texas al¬ 
lowed. “You could whip that man with one hand 
if you’d sail into him—why, I tell you he’d run so 
fast you never would be able to overtake him be¬ 
tween here and the Nation.” 

Noggle looked back, and around him, to make 
certain that Smith had not followed nor cut across 
and headed them off. 

“I’ll do it, too! If I could ever git him in the 
shop for a shave I’d cut his throat clean down to 
his backbone!” 

“I don’t think he’ll put his head in a trap that- 
away. You buy yourself a gun, and you wear it 
when you step out; then you march up to that man 
and slap his jaw and spraddle all over him like old 
folks. He’ll beat time hittin’ a streak out of this 
town, and I’ll bet you a purty he will.” 

Noggle didn’t warm up to the suggestion. Texas 
could see through him all around the edges; he 
hadn’t any more heat in him than a hickory shad. 
He felt sorry for Malvina, for he knew that if there 
was any fighting to be done in that family she 
would have to do it, and he believed she would do 


222 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


it if it came to pass where Zeb Smith ever ruffled 
a curl of Ollie’s small, brainless head. 

Ollie entered the hotel by a side door, and in his 
gratitude drew Texas in after him, where both of 
them were almost enveloped in Malvina’s grateful 
embrace. Texas avoided her arms only by a quick 
withdrawal into the background, leaving the bar¬ 
ber to bear it all alone. 

Malvina cried a little, and declared that she 
thought he had been killed, which gave Ollie a lead 
for the announcement of his bloody intentions in 
regard to Zeb Smith. Malvina’s cheeks paled on 
hearing this, and she clung to her new husband with 
trembling hands, for she knew that he was a sheep 
in his heart and a rabbit in his soul, but he was 
kind to her, and took off his hat when he met her 
on the street. 

As for Texas, the valor of the barber in the 
house was not so diverting that moment as it might 
have been but for a circumstance that drew his at¬ 
tention toward the office, partly seen through the 
open door. A man had entered and saluted Mrs. 
Goodloe with friendly word, and was now selecting 
a cigar from the offering out of the showcase sup¬ 
porting the bell. His voice came into the room dis¬ 
tinctly, and it was one that Texas would have 
known out of all the tumult of the earth. 

There could not be two men afflicted with that 


223 


THE BANJO NOTE 

same, nosy, metallic, whanging voice. The man at 
the showcase was the one who had cursed Fannie 
Goodnight, and taunted him as he lay bound in the 
Texans’ rawhide that night beside his supper fire. 

Texas stepped to the door for a look at the 
man’s face, but he had his cigar, and was going out 
to the street. He hastened to Mrs. Goodloe, eager 
in manner and voice, inquiring who her customer 
was. 

“Why, that was Henry Stott, the banker. I 
thought you’d met Henry.” 

“I believe I have,” said Texas grimly. 

He stepped to the office door and looked after 
the banker as he passed down the street, the smoke 
of his cigar trailing after him. He was safe, he 
was anchored there, he wouldn’t get away. And 
to-morrow there would be a reckoning between 
them. 

So Stott was playing a double game against the 
cattlemen of that range. Doubtless the past three 
or four years of prosperity there had made loans 
slow, and the income from interest was not as brisk 
as it should have been. To make things merrier, 
Stott had gone back to his old trade of importing 
southern cattle, buying them with the funds of his 
depositors whose herds were now in peril. 

If the cattlemen could be convinced of Stott’s 
hand in bringing this danger to their herds, it would 


224 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


be all day with the banker’s future schemes in that 
country. He would be a lucky man, indeed, if he 
didn’t stretch a lariat on somebody’s up-ended 
wagon-tongue. 

In the morning, Texas determined, his first busi¬ 
ness would be to hire a horse and ride to Duncan’s, 
and lay the matter before the president of the Cat¬ 
tle Raisers’ Association. For there could be no 
mistaking Stott; there could not be two men in the 
world, indeed, affected with voices such as his, and 
especially not in the small compass of Cottonwood 
and its tributary range. 

But why wait for morning to go to Duncan’s? 
The thought took hold of him with the eagerness 
of fire in dry grass. The desire to vindicate him¬ 
self, and stand clean in the eyes of the men who had 
trusted him, was in his throat like a thirst. Dun¬ 
can would return to Cottonwood with him; they 
could be there by the time Stott opened the bank 
in the morning. 

Within half an hour Hartwell was on his way 
to Duncan’s ranch, the cool night wind in his hot 
face as he galloped with free rein over the old cat¬ 
tle trail that led back into his native land. 


CHAPTER XVI 


DISCHARGED 

T EXAS HARTWELL rode back to Cotton¬ 
wood the next afternoon, a disappointed and 
humiliated man. Malcolm Duncan had 
listened to his charges involving Henry Stott with 
surprise which grew into incredulity, and at last 
broke in a storm of open scorn. 

It was impossible that Stott could have had a 
hand in running the Texas cattle, Duncan said. 
He had known Stott for years, and had done busi¬ 
ness with him long enough to know that he was 
a square man, and above any such double-handed 
dealing as that charged. 

“We’ll let this go no further,” said Duncan, as 
if doing Hartwell a great favor in burying the 
charges in his breast. “I wouldn’t want to stand 
in your shoes if Henry ever hears of this.” 

Duncan went farther; he advised Hartwell to 
take the first train out of Cottonwood, no matter 
which way it was going. He was still giving Texas 
the benefit of the doubt that he held in his case, ac¬ 
cording to the basic justness of his mind. 

Hartwell appreciated this half fairness, even 
225 



226 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


though he saw that his case was hopeless with the 
cattlemen. Fannie Goodnight’s testimony, even 
though he might be able to bring her forward to 
speak in his behalf, would have no weight against 
the word of a man like Stott. 

Fannie appeared to have dropped out of that 
part of the world. Since his return to Cottonwood 
Hartwell had kept a vain lookout for her. Of 
Stott’s. complicity he had not the faintest doubt. 
The banker was not only involved, but was the lead¬ 
ing power in the venture of the Texas herd. But 
Hartwell was sick of the hopelessness of ever prov¬ 
ing it, heavy with the depression that had been 
added to his already gloomy load. 

Stott was bound to hear of his charge to Duncan, 
in spite of the cow-man’s apparent generosity. 
When it came to the banker’s ears he would be hot 
to silence the source of it. More gun-slingers 
would be set after Texas; awake and asleep he 
would strain and listen for their feet behind him. 
Truly, Duncan’s advice to quit the country was 
kind counsel, but his going would be his conviction 
in the minds of the few who still believed in him 
there. He would not go under a cloud, not if all 
the gun-slingers on the Arkansas Valley range put 
his name down in their books of doom. 

Uncle Boley was not working when Texas went 
to the shop to report on his absence and the cause 


DISCHARGED 


227 


of it. The old man was sitting behind the counter 
in his chair, his empty bench before him, his tools 
lying where he had put them down, a partly fin¬ 
ished boot standing on the floor. The only indica¬ 
tion that Uncle Boley had any interest at all left 
in his business was the waxed-end which he held 
in his mouth, dark-trailing over his white beard. 

“Well, Texas, you’re back, and hell’s to pay— 
hel-l’s to pay!” 

Uncle Boley was disturbed beyond anything in 
his carriage that Texas ever had witnessed. He 
got up, rather hurriedly, chewing on the thread as 
if he would bite it in two, shook his head, sighed. 
Texas was alarmed. He felt a coldness as of 
some approaching dread come over him as he hur¬ 
ried forward. 

“What’s the matter, Uncle Boley? What’s hap¬ 
pened, sir?” 

“Hell’s to pay and no pitch hot!” said Uncle 
Boley gloomily. “They’ve fired Sallie.” 

“Fired her? You don’t tell me, sir! What 
reason in this world could they—” 

“For bein’ seen walkin’ along the street with a 
feller called Texas Hartwell, the most suspicioned 
feller this side of No Man’s Land.” 

“Can it be possible that I have brought this 
calamity to Miss Sallie, sir?” 

Texas stood before the old man, his face blood- 


228 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


less, his nostrils flaring as if he breathed acid. He 
was struck rigid by the news, a cold, deep fury in 
him that seemed to clog his blood. 

“It’s a fact, to the shame and disgrace of this 
town. She’s fired, turned out like she was a 
strumpet in the street, and her the cleanest, purest 
little flower that ever kissed the wind.” 

“I’ve brought that on her! It was a woeful day, 
Uncle Boley, that I ever struck this town!” 

“You ain’t to blame, Texas; I know you’re 
clean.” 

“But what will she think about me, sir?” 

“I was to blame, more than either of you two— 
I sent you off together to pick them flow^s. 
Stroud—he’s at the bottom of it—he’s been tryin’ 
to marry Sallie two or three years, and him old 
enough to be her daddy twice.” 

“We saw the scoun’rel; he slunk away before we 
could speak to him, right at the schoolhouse door.” 

“Stroud must ’a’ done it for revenge on Sallie. 
He took it up with Henry Stott, chairman of the 
board, and the other two members follered Stott’s 
lead. Stott thought firin’ her on your account 
would make him a little soldier with the cow-men.” 

“Let me tell you something about Stott, sir,” 
Texas requested, his hand earnestly on the old 
man’s shoulder. And there he told him of his dis¬ 
covery the night past, of his ride to Duncan’s, and 


DISCHARGED 


229 


of Duncan’s angry refusal to entertain the charge. 

Uncle Boley nodded now and then as Hartwell 
proceeded to the end. 

“Stott’s workin’ to blacken you so deep nobody’ll 
believe you. He don’t want you to have any 
standin’ at all in case you ever suspicion him and 
tell it. Firin’ Sallie helps. It shows you up as a 
man with a curse ag’in’ him that passes on to who- 
somever he touches.” 

Texas stood, shoulders up, his body stiff as iron, 
his eyes fixed in frowning glare on the street 
through the open door as the old man spoke. Now 
he turned suddenly, holding out his hand as if in 
farewell. 

Lifting wondering eyes, Uncle Boley took it, and 
felt that it was as cold as the flesh of the dead. 

“Uncle Boley, you’ve been a powerful good 
friend to me; you’ve stood by me when I was a 
kicked dog in the corner, and I’ll carry the grati¬ 
tude for it in the warmest place in my heart, sir, 
the longest day I live. If I don’t happen to see 
you no more, sir, I want you to know that I wish 
you well, now and hereafter, for evermore.” 

“Why, in God’s name, boy—why, Texas—what 
—what’re you goin’ to do?” 

The old man clung to his hand, stroking it with 
his grease-black fingers, looking up at his young 
friend with frightened, appealing eyes. 


230 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


“I’m a goin’ to call that scoun’rel out, sir, and 
give him the chance for his life he doesn’t deserve. 
I’m either a goin’ to kill him or he’ll kill me!” 

“Stroud—do you mean Stroud?” 

“I mean that polecat Stott, Uncle Boley. Him 
and me can’t breathe together in this world one hour 
more.” 

“Wait a minute—wait a minute or two, Texas. 
Let me think this over—let me think it over, son.” 

Uncle Boley was pathetic in his perplexity. 
Tears came wandering down his beard; his hand 
shook as he clung to Hartwell to hold him back 
from the execution of his desperate resolution. 
“Sir—” 

“It wouldn’t do any good to kill him—if you kill 
him you’ll shut up the last mouth that can clear 
you, Texas—don’t you see you will?” 

“Uncle Boley, I’ll make him sign a statement. 
There ain’t no argument and no pleadin’ under the 
sun can stop me in what I’ve set out to do.” 

Texas was gone before more could be said to 
delay him. Uncle Boley went to the door and 
looked after him, a score of wild schemes rising in 
his mind to hurry after him and prevent the trag¬ 
edy, but each of them he dropped as quickly as it 
came to him, and stood silent and impotent while 
Texas rushed along the street toward the bank. 
The wrath of a patient man had broken its re- 


DISCHARGED 


231 


straint; Uncle Boley knew that if he met Stott he 
would kill him, with no thought of future conse¬ 
quences to himself. 

It was easy to follow Hartwell’s progress along 
the street, for people fell out of his way as if he 
came carrying the contamination of a fatal disease. 
Those who did not know him, and had no reason 
to fear him for his notoriety, read in his face some¬ 
thing that made them give him a wide road, and 
stand gazing after him to see where his wrath would 
fall. Uncle Boley groaned, believing that this was 
indeed the great day of trouble, as Hartwell disap¬ 
peared in the bank. 

Uncle Boley could not remain in the door any 
longer. He feared to see what was to follow; 
feared that he might be called upon to give testi¬ 
mony against Texas in the dread hour of his trial. 
There would be enough to do that without him, for 
people were pressing toward the bank, craning 
necks, crowding upon each other’s heels, to see what 
this desperate man was about to do. 

Uncle Boley could read in their excitement that 
they believed Texas was going to rob the bank, for 
some of them were running as if to summon help or 
arm themselves for the protection of their money in 
Henry Stott’s safe. Uncle Boley turned from the 
door. 

Back behind his counter he sat huddled, an old, 


232 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


old man for the first time in his life, fearing to hear 
what he listened for, afraid of the rush in the street 
that would tell him the thing was done. A long 
time he listened, and grew dumb in his sickening 
anxiety. At last there came a step that he knew on 
the walk before his door, and a form in the frame 
of it that was dearer to him than he would have 
owned an hour ago. Texas was back, heavy of 
foot and weary. 

“He went to Kansas City last night,” he said. 

Uncle Boley clasped his hands to his temples and 
bowed his head. 

“Thank God!” he said. 

So he sat, his white head bent, his calloused hands 
clasping his temples. Texas stood beside the 
counter, panting. His face was white as if only 
the ashes of his soul remained out of the fire of his 
anger. 

“I can wait,” he said. 

Uncle Boley slowly lifted his head. There were 
tears on his beard again; a look of age such as he 
never had worn before made his face softly sad and 
gentle. He got up, reaching out his hand with the 
groping slowness of a blind man, touched Texas on 
the shoulder, ran his fingers down his arm as if to 
satisfy himself that Hartwell had indeed returned. 

“Thank God!” he said again. 


DISCHARGED 233 

“He’ll come back in a day or two, they said. I 
can wait.” 

“Yes, we can all wait,” Uncle Boley said. “We 
can wait the Almighty’s time to make straight the 
crooked paths and lead every man to his punish¬ 
ment and reward. I thank God that Henry Stott 
was gone! There was more than chance in it. Go 
and pump a fresh bucket of water, son, and take 
a good drink, and come back here and set down and 
cool off and take possession of your mind.” 

Texas did as the old man bade him. He put his 
hat down on the floor beside his heel when he came 
back and sat near Uncle Boley, his long black hair 
wild on his forehead, his face as gaunt as a man 
who had but one desire in him, and that a desire 
hot in his heart as molten iron. 

Uncle Boley thought of ten reasons to base an 
argument on against killing Henry Stott, but he 
saw that none of them would be effective in Hart¬ 
well’s present high state of strain and anger. Let 
him cool a night, and then reason it with him; that 
would be the plan. So Uncle Boley took up his 
work, making a show of being composed, and 
sewed on quite a spell with never a word. 

“Have you seen Miss Sallie since this trouble 
happened to her, Uncle Boley?” 

Texas appeared to be cooling off already. His 


234 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


voice was steady, and it sounded like it came out 
of a reasonable man. But Uncle Boley saw that 
the fire of destruction still raged in his soul, for the 
reflection of it was glowing in his eyes. 

“She stopped in here on her way home this morn¬ 
ing, as broke up over it as a young bird that’s been 
blowed out of its nest in a storm.” 

“Did she have much blame to lay on me, sir?” 

“She didn’t have one word of blame for you, 
Texas.” 

“But don’t you reckon she must feel I’m a 
scoun’rel, Uncle Boley?” 

“I don’t recollect that she said any such a word.” 

“Everybody’s down on me so in this country; all 
but you and one or two others, that I couldn’t blame 
her. I’ve bungled things since I came to this 
place—I’ve stumbled around like a blind horse.” 

“Well, don’t muss ’em up any worse from now 
on than you can help, son. You wasn’t to blame 
for what’s happened, only for lettin’ that girl rope 
you in down there on the line that night, and I 
reckon I’d ’a’ done the same thing if I’d ’a’ been in 
your place, or most any man would.” 

n Yes, that was my one mistake,” Texas admitted 
regretfully. “And I suspicioned something, all the 
time, too. But it’s done now, sir, and regrets won’t 
never set it straight. They come too late to do any 
good, just like that girl tryin’ to warn me after them 


DISCHARGED 235 

fellers .was standin’ around me with their ropes in 
their hands.” 

“I want you to cool off on this business of Henry 
Stott, Texas, and in the morning we’ll talk it over, 
ca’m and reasonable. No, don’t up and tell me 
now what you’re goin’ to do when he comes back. 
A night makes a mighty big difference in a feller’s 
plans sometimes—a difference as wide as the State 
of Kansas. You go along up and see Sallie after 
a while, and talk it over with her and her ma, and 
see what they think about it.” 

“Do you think Miss Sallie would care to see me, 
sir, after this disgrace I’ve fetched on her?” 

“I’d run the resk if I was in your place.” 

Texas took up his hat, a look of eagerness in his 
eyes, a flush of color driving the pallor of his dying 
anger out of his face. 

“I’ll go right on up, sir; I’ve got a whole lot I 
want to say to her and explain. I aim to tell her 
what I’ve found out about Stott.” 

“I believe I’d wait till after supper,” Uncle Boley 
suggested kindly, to cover the humiliation that lay 
in the caution, “till along after dark a little while.” 

Texas dropped his hat, the eager light flick&ed 
out of his eyes. 

“Yes, I don’t want to take any more trouble and 
disgrace to her door. I’ll wait till after dark.” 


CHAPTER XVII 


FRIENDS FOR ISHMAEL 

M RS. McCOY received Texas in subdued 
severity. She was a tall, dark woman, 
proud and handsome, an aristocrat in 
every line of her body, every tradition of her past. 
She was as strangely out of place in Cottonwood as 
a fine vase would have been on Malvina Noggle’s 
shelf among the thick, chipped china at the green 
hotel. But not more aristocratic, nor high and 
mighty in her bearing, that evening than Texas 
Hartwell, indeed. He had not come to that house 
as a penitent or a culprit seeking exculpation, but 
as a gentleman who was sure of himself, across 
whose conscience not a shadow fell. He came as a 
champion, to give his earnest pledge that he would 
see the wrongs righted for both Sallie and himself 
before he left that town. 

This he hastened to tell Mrs. McCoy, standing in 
the hall, where his features were clouded in the light 
of the candle that she carried. She stood very erect 
and dignified, and heard him through his brief and 
earnest introduction without comment. 

“Step inside, sir; I will light the lamp,” she said, 
236 


FRIENDS FOR ISHMAEL 


237 


indicating the open door of the living-room, the 
candle lifted shoulder-high as she studied his 
solemn face. She said no more until she had reg¬ 
ulated the flame of the reading-lamp, which stood 
among disordered piles of books on the big library 
table as if a castle of them had fallen to ruin there. 

“Miss McCoy cannot be seen, sir.” 

She seated herself, her face turned partly to the 
light, and looked across at Texas, unfriendly, hard, 
censorious. 

“I am sorry, ma’am; I wished—” 

“She is sick, the doctor has just left her side. 
She is crushed, Mr. Hartwell; her heart is broken 
by this great disgrace you have brought on her. 
You have brought it most thoughtlessly, sir, whether 
you are innocent or guilty of the charges which men 
lay to your door.” 

“Mrs. McCoy, ma’am—” 

“A gentleman, sir, even a guilty one, would have 
thought twice before compromising a girl as young 
and unsophisticated as my daughter, by appearing 
in public at her side.” 

Hartwell was so deeply moved by her arraign¬ 
ment, soft-spoken, but cutting, and doubly cutting 
from the very refinement of her pose and speech, 
that he rose to his feet. He stood, tall and judicial 
before her, his somber coat well suited to the se¬ 
vere lines of his harsh, honest face. 


238 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


“Ma’am, I don’t feel any mortification for the 
part I took in Miss McCoy’s innocent trip to the 
hay-meadow after flowers, ma’am. I don’t feel 
anything but resentment for the narrow view these 
pore, ornery people have taken, ma’am, for she 
could walk by my side for a thousand years 
and never have cause to blush or turn her face 
away.” 

“A Tittle thought beforehand would have been 
much better than a great deal of declamation after¬ 
wards, Mr. Hartwell. You are a disgraced man in 
this community, sir; you are charged with the be¬ 
trayal of a sacred trust, and you have not refuted 
it.” 

“I’ll do it, ma’am, to the satisfaction of every¬ 
body. I came here to-night to tell you-all about 
something that I’ve found out, ma’am.” 

“Your private affairs are of no interest to my 
daughter or to me, sir.” 

“Since I have been the cause of so much dis¬ 
tress—” 

“The kindest thing you can do, sir, will be to 
leave Cottonwood at once, and carry your unfor¬ 
tunate taint with you.” 

“I can’t leave under a taint, Mrs. McCoy. I 
have matters to adjust here when a certain man 
returns.” 

Texas spoke so earnestly, his face was so stern, 


FRIENDS FOR ISHMAEL 239 

that she looked up at him with a quick and fright¬ 
ened start. 

“Killing men, Mr. Hartwell, never will clear you 
of the charge that stands against you, nor wipe 
away the disgrace that has come to this house 
through you. For Heaven’s sake, go—leave Cot¬ 
tonwood—without making any more trouble! ” 

Texas was hurt to the marrow by her unwilling¬ 
ness to believe him, by her harping on the one 
string of his taint, and the sorrow that had come 
from it to her door. He felt that there was no use 
in going into the matter of Henry Stott’s connection 
with his unfortunate entanglement, no profit in re¬ 
maining there another minute in fruitless attempt 
to place himself in a more favorable light. Per¬ 
haps if Sallie had been there it would have been 
different. But Sallie was tossing that moment on 
her bed, burning in the fever of the first shame that 
ever had come into her life. 

“You are a man of violence, Mr. Hartwell, you 
came into my daughter’s notice by a violent deed. 
What can an outcast man, such as your doings in 
this country have made you, hope to gain by fur¬ 
ther violence? Surely not vindication!” 

“It’s guilty folks that talk of vindication, mainly, 
ma’am. I want justice.” 

“And my poor daughter—who will give her 
justice?” 


240 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


“I thought of waitin’ on the school-board, or at 
least a part of them, ma’am.” 

The proposal alarmed Mrs. McCoy. She ex¬ 
claimed sharply against it, starting to her feet, con¬ 
fronting him with panic in her eyes. 

“It would only make it worse! No, no! The 
kindest deed you can do will be to leave Cottonwood 
at once.” 

“If .1 could bring peace back to Miss McCoy by 
going, ma’am—” 

“We might be able to fix matters up—I might 
get her place back for her, if you were out of the 
way.” 

Texas stood a little while, his head bowed, the 
weight of his contemplation heavy upon him. 

“But I can’t leave for a few days,” he said, his 
voice scarcely above his breath, as if he communed 
with himself. Then frankly to her: “I’ll not 
promise you to leave, Mrs. McCoy, proud as I’d be 
to oblige you. I’ve set out to clear myself before 
these cattlemen, and I’m a going to do it. When 
it’s done, and you folks get your eyes open and see 
me right, I’ll bid you fare-you-well.” 

“It was an unfortunate wind that blew you here.” 

“Ma’am, it was so. If it wasn’t for Uncle 
Boley—” 

“That poor, simple old man! Do you want to 


FRIENDS FOR ISHMAEL 


241 


ruin him, too—don’t you know he must suffer ruin 
if you keep on hanging around him?” 

“I’ve discussed that with him, ma’am. His 
heart’s too big for the little house he lives in, 
ma’am; he’s a gentleman from the ground up.” 

“Don’t bring disaster to him in his old age, then. 
His business will suffer the minute the cattlemen 
hear he’s standing up for you, the poor old sim¬ 
pleton ! ” 

“Good night, ma’am,” said Texas shortly, start¬ 
ing for the door. 

He was affronted by her interpretation of Uncle 
Boley’s loyalty to him. Simpleton, indeed! If 
she could have seen that old man’s face when he 
came back from Stott’s bank—but it was useless to 
burn himself out with such thoughts. He stopped 
in the hall and faced her solemnly. 

“Mrs. McCoy, you’d have been further disgraced 
through me if it hadn’t been for Uncle Boley,” he 
said. 

“Sir?” 

“It was at Uncle Boley’s hint that I waited till 
after dark to come here and see you and try to fetch 
a little comfort and cheer to you and Miss McCoy, 
ma’am. If it hadn’t been for him I’d ’a’ rushed off 
up here in broad daylight. And I never was a man 
that shunned the light of day before in my life. 


242 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


I’ll seek you no more, and trouble you no more. If 
there’s any seekin’ to be done, ma’am, it will come 
from the other side.” 

“If either my daughter or I need you, Mr. Hart¬ 
well, we’ll call you,” said she, with polite contempt. 
She opened the door. “Good-night, sir, and good- 
by.” 

Texas left that house with a feeling that he never 
had carried away from a house before in his life— 
a feeling of chastisement, of blame. Truly, he was 
an outcast in Cottonwood and the Arkansas Valley 
range, hopeless of ever setting things right. Per¬ 
haps it would be best for everybody but himself if 
he would leave Cottonwood at once, as Mrs. McCoy 
had suggested. 

With him out of the way the sky would clear 
immediately for Sallie. Her discharge had been a 
stroke by Stott to get him out of the country, and 
doubtless the hint had been conveyed to her mother 
that all would be forgotten if he would leave Cot¬ 
tonwood, never to return. Stott was uncomfortable 
with him there. It had been Stott’s intention to 
leave him bound in the thicket by Clear Creek un¬ 
til he perished, and he never had expected to see 
him back in Cottonwood with his dangerous secret. 

And there was Uncle Boley, defiant, bold, court¬ 
ing the displeasure of his patrons every hour. Mrs. 
McCoy had spoken truly; his hanging on under the 


FRIENDS FOR ISHMAEL 


243 


protection of the old man would mean the ruin of 
his business. All considered, perhaps it would be 
the bravest, the wisest, and the best thing to do to 
pick up and leave that night. 

But the story of his treason would follow him as 
far as men rode after cattle, along with the disgrace 
of having fled under Dee Winch’s threat. He 
might leave present trouble, and clear the atmos¬ 
phere for those behind him, but he would walk out 
into deeper disgrace himself. He would be like a 
man with an untried indictment against him on 
some hideous charge, the knowledge of which would 
cause men to shun him like a leper. 

He was all but isolated by his trouble, and his 
final conclusion was, as he pondered the situation, 
that running away would not brighten his surround¬ 
ings. It bore on him with oppression, like an old 
sorrow, or a family wrong which honor demanded 
him to avenge, but some insuperable obstacle made 
impossible to effect. Added to this was the melan¬ 
choly that had steeped him like a fog since the mes¬ 
sage came from Winch. There was a brand on 
him, and a taint which the wind carried abroad. 
He was a listening man. 

It was in such bitterness of mind that he came 
past Ollie Noggle’s shop, and crossed the barber’s 
way as he turned from locking his front door. It 
was a late and quiet hour for the business block of 


244 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


Cottonwood, and the street was empty at that mo¬ 
ment, but Noggle looked round him with what ap¬ 
peared to be an apprehensive sweep before speaking 
to Hartwell, who had paused waiting the barber’s 
approach. 

Hartwell thought he was exploring around for 
sight of his dreaded enemy, Zeb Smith. Noggle, he 
noticed, was armed with a revolver that looked 
rather small in comparison with his length of limb. 
He kept putting back the skirt of his seersucker 
coat to show the weapon, which had a mother-of- 
pearl handle, and was slung in a holster of patent 
leather. 

“Hi’re y’u?” said Noggle, still turning his look 
up and down the street, an air of abstraction and 
uneasiness about him altogether strange. 

“Middlin’,” Texas replied. “Was you headin’ 
for home?” 

“Ye-es,” allowed the barber, standing with his 
revolver showing under the street light, looking this 
way and that, his mind plainly not on his answer. 

“I’m headin’ down that di-rection,” said Texas. 

Noggle did not make any move to fall in for the 
march to Malvina’s embrace. He stood teetering 
on his long legs like some kind of insect stuck in 
glue, watching around him with an air of suspicion 
and fear that spoke little for his confidence in his 
gun. 


FRIENDS FOR ISHMAEL 


245 


“Well, I tell you,. Hartwell,” said he, “I was just 
a thinkin’, you know, that maybe you’d better go 
on ahead, or let me go on ahead, you know. You 
know, you ain’t in very good standin’ here in Cot¬ 
tonwood, Hartwell, and it’s apt to hurt my business 
to be seen out with you, you know.” 

He hummed and hawed a good deal in getting it 
out, and shifted from leg to leg like an embarrassed 
schoolgirl. Texas felt the blood come hot into his 
face, and his scorn for this chicken-headed shaver 
of gritty chins knocking at his teeth for utterance. 
He held himself in with an effort, and managed to 
speak without a tremor, although he flavored his 
words with a dash of contempt which was lost 
on Noggle as completely as a drop of his per¬ 
fume would have been overwhelmed in a barrel of 
tar. 

“I wouldn’t take a shave away from you for a 
million dollars, or more,” Texas said. “I’ll go 
ahead, for I’m in a hurry to go to bed. It’ll count 
more for you to have folks think you’re chasin’ me 
than that I’m a chasin’ you.” 

“All right, Hartwell. A man’s got to look out 
for number one, you know, specially if he’s got a 
wife dependin’ on him.” 

Hartwell did not feel that he could be trusted to 
make comment on that plea. He hurried off to¬ 
ward the hotel, where he was in earnest conversa- 


246 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


tion with Malvina when Noggle came grinning in 
at the office door. 

“Was somebody sayin’ you’d hurt my business if 
you stayed on here at the hotel, Mr. Hartwell?” 
Malvina demanded, rather severely, at that moment. 

Noggle stopped when the words hit him, and 
jerked back like a foolish horse rearing against the 
halter; The animated triumph which suffused his 
narrow face over the feat of threading alone the 
perils of the streets faded out of him, leaving him 
the color of a boiled ear of corn. 

“No, ma’am; nobody was sayin’ that in so many 
words, ma’am,” Texas replied; “but takin’ the 
events of the day to base my judgment on, it might 
turn out thataway.” 

“Wait till it does,” said she, with firm and lofty 
finality. 

“I think it will be the wisest thing for me to pack 
out of here, and bring no trouble to your door, Mrs. 
Noggle,” Texas maintained. “I seem to leave a 
trail of bad luck behind me, and you-all have been 
so kind to me here I’d rather cut my arm off than 
cause you to lose a dollar.” 

Malvina was behind the counter, her round white 
arms resting on the showcase, her round, freckled 
face as full of softness and good-nature as a human 
countenance could contain. Noggles came up and 
cleared his throat. 


FRIENDS FOR ISHMAEL 247 

“I expect if he wants to leave, Malvina, you’d 
better let him,” he suggested. 

“What’s bitin’ you?” said Malvina, not even 
turning her eyes in her husband’s direction. 

Texas could not forbear landing one little dig, 
one little barb of discomfort, in Noggle’s perfumed 
hide. 

“Even your husband is afraid to be seen on the 
street with me any more,” said he. 

Malvina turned to Noggle now with fire in her 
eyes. 

“Oh, he is, is he?” 

“If it would hurt his business, ma’am, what 
might my stoppin’ here in the ho -tel do to yours?” 

Malvina took her arms down from the showcase, 
and came round from behind the counter. The 
color was gone out of her face, and her eyes were 
very bright. 

“Mr. Hartwell, maybe there are some people in 
the world little enough to put business above grati¬ 
tude,” said she, never turning an eye toward her 
wilted, shifting husband; “but I’m not one of that 
kind.” 

She faced Noggle, burning him with a look that 
made him squirm. 

“Maybe you’re afraid to be seen on the street 
with Mr. Hartwell, but I ain’t! I ain’t afraid to 
be seen anywhere with him; I’d go to—” 


248 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


“Well, Malvina, a man’s got to think of his busi¬ 
ness, you know.” 

“Yes, and I’d let him have room and board in 
this house if the last cow-man on the range turned 
from the door on account of it, and I’d tell ’em all 
to go straight to hell!” 

“Well, Malvina, you know—” 

“I’d give him my last dollar if he wanted it, and 
if that wasn’t enough I’d go out and borrow more! 
As far as I’m concerned they can all go straight—” 

“So would I!” said Mrs. Goodloe, coming into 
the dining-room door, her arms red from dishwater, 
her apron wet from the splashings of it. 

“The trouble with people in this town is they 
don’t know a man when they see one,” Malvina de¬ 
clared; “that’s what the trouble with these run¬ 
downs is!” 

Texas took off his hat and gave Malvina his 
hand. 

“Ma’am, I’m proud to know you!” he said. He 
stepped over to Mrs. Goodloe and shook hands with 
her. “And you, too, ma’am—I’m proud to know 
you both.” 

Noggle stood rubbing the back of his hand across 
his big mustache, no doubt feeling something like 
an outsider in the midst of his own family. He 
was well enough broken-in already to offer no fur¬ 
ther comment. All he did was stretch hugely, gape 


FRIENDS FOR ISHMAEL 


249 


amazingly, and take off his little dove-gray hat and 
try to look unconcerned as became a valiant man 
with a thirty-two caliber pistol at his belt. 

“Gosh! I’m as tired as a wet dog,” he said. 

“You better go to bed, then,” said Malvina, at no 
pains to cover her displeasure with her new mate. 

Noggle acted on the suggestion at once, heaving 
himself off up-stairs on his long, ostrich legs, his 
light trousers making quite an elegant showing 
as they flickered between the balusters. Malvina 
shifted the register, and dusted the place where it 
had lain with her apron, saying nothing until Nog- 
gle’s feet had sounded along the uncarpeted hall 
overhead and come to silence. 

“There was a man here lookin’ for you a little 
while before you came in, Mr. Hartwell,” she said. 

“Did you know who he was?” 

“No, he was a stranger to me—a little dark man 
off of the range somewhere. Well, I don’t know 
all of ’em—new ones is cornin’ in all the time. He 
said he’d be back.” 

“I’ll set outside by the door and wait for him, 
thank you, ma’am.” 

“Don’t you mention it,” returned Malvina with 
such stress of earnestness that it was almost a threat. 
“Wouldn’t you like a cup of coffee and a piece of 
pie?” 

“Thank you, ma’am, most kindly, but I’m so full 


250 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


of trouble I ain’t got room for anything else. I 
don’t feel like I want to eat again for seven or eight 
years.” 

“It’ll all come out right—don’t you worry over it, 
Mr. Hartwell.” 

“For my own part I can carry it; but look what 
I’ve brought on Miss Sallie McCoy, ma’am.” 

Malvina was wiping the showcase with her apron 
now, her head behind it, her face hidden. 

“You was up there to see them this evening, 
wasn’t you?” 

“Yes, I called in on ’em for a minute.” 

“I heard they had the doctor for Sallie.” 

“So her mother told me, ma’am.” 

“It’s a shame the way the school-board treated 
that girl! But it’s nothing to get sick over—she 
knows she wasn’t hurt nor spoilt by bein’ seen 
walkin’ along the street with you. It’s foolish, 
plumb foolish!” 

“But knowin’ he’s to blame for trouble like that 
is as draggin’ on a man as a broken leg, ma’am. 
When did that man say he’d be back?” 

“In a little while, he said.” 

“I’ll set out in the cool of the night and wait for 
him, and thank you most generous for all your kind¬ 
ness to a footless stranger like me, ma’am.” 

Texas went out and sat on the bench along the 
hotel wall. There was a little space between the 


FRIENDS FOR ISHMAEL 


251 


sidewalk and the building, and he sat in the shadow 
where he could see readily but be seen indistinctly. 
He was troubled over this stranger’s presence in 
Cottonwood, for he believed it must be some mes¬ 
senger from Winch with a fresh taunt and defiance, 
or from Duncan, bearing word that would add to 
his unrest. 


CHAPTER XVIII 


AN UNEXPECTED ALLY 

F EW people were passing that hour, for it 
was late for respectable Cottonwood, and 
the other half didn’t roam down into that 
section. Texas had not waited long on the bench 
beside the door, scanning hurriedly every man who 
came into view, his mind alert, his hand ready to his 
gun, when the one for whom he waited came. 

The stranger approached him without hesitation, 
Texas standing, turning to bring his elbow free 
from interference against the wall. 

“Hello, Texas,” came the familiar hail. 

“Sir, good evening,” Texas returned, watching 
the stranger narrowly, puzzled by his familiarity. 

The stranger was of medium height, but' slender. 
He was dressed in the regulation cowboy style, ex¬ 
cept that his chaparejos were of plain leather in¬ 
stead of the hairy kind so much in vogue at that 
time on the Arkansas Valley range. 

He was standing where the light fell full on him 
through the open door, and the friendliness of his 
attitude was as mystifying to Texas as his identity. 
“Don’t you know me, Texas?” 

252 


AN UNEXPECTED ALLY 


25J 


He came a step nearer, turning his head in the 
light so Texas could see his face clearly. But be¬ 
yond establishing that he was a comely youth, dark- 
skinned as an Indian, with dark hair cut close to 
his handsome head, Texas could make out nothing 
at all. 

“No, sir; you’ve got me, as sure as you’re born.” 

“Why, I’m your old side-pardner, Ben Chouteau, 
from the Nation,” said the unaccountable stranger, 
speaking a little louder, for the benefit of Malvina, 
apparently, who had come to the door. 

Texas started at the clearer note of that boyish 
treble, held out his hand, giving the cowboy the 
grip of genuine friendliness. 

“I’m glad to see you—I’m more than glad, old 
feller!” he said. “It’s an old friend of mine, a 
sure-enough good friend, like the rest of you-all 
here at this ho- tel, ma’am,” he assured Malvina,, 
who nodded, entirely satisfied, and returned to her 
duties within the house. 

Texas drew the stranger into the shadow, still 
holding him by the hand. 

“Miss Fannie!” he whispered. “Where in this 
world did you come from—what’re you doin’ rigged 
up thataway?” 

“Even you didn’t know me!” 

“Not till you spoke loud thataway, then it come 
to me in a flash.” 


254 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


“I’m supposed to be dead, Texas.” 

“You don’t tell me, Miss Fannie!” 

“Well, I am. So we’ve got to go easy, and don’t 
forget I’m your old side-pardner from the Nation, 
and Ben Chouteau’s my name.” 

“I’ll remember; don’t you doubt I’ll remember.” 

“I’ve come back to this town to throw a crimp 
into some of the crooks that thought they’d salted 
my old hide down, and I want you to help me, 
Texas.” 

“My heart’s with you, and my hand’s the same 
as your own.” 

“We’ll have a bunch of these crooks breakin’ 
their necks to hit the timber before this time to¬ 
morrow night. But I don’t want to talk around 
here where somebody might be listenin’. Do you 
care to take a little walk?” 

They walked toward the railroad station, for in 
that direction the town quickly blended out to open 
prairie, where there was room for all the confidences 
in the world to pass from ear to ear without danger 
of a leak. They came into range of a noise of 
shouting men and the rumble of hoofs on planks 
as they left the town, telling that cattle were being 
loaded. 

“It’s that Texas crowd,” said Fannie; “they’re 
roundin’ them up fast. They shipped a big bunch 
two days ago, they told me—I came up that way 


AN UNEXPECTED ALLY 255 

to-day, passed right through the thick of them. I 
guess there’ll not be any trouble over them.” 

“Lucky for Stott!” said he. 

“How did you know Stott was in it, Texas?” 

“I knew him by his cussed voice.” 

“Anybody would that ever heard him twice.” 

They sat down by the roadside, far from any 
house. There was no moon, but starlight strong 
enough to break the density of the night, and a soft 
wind filled with the spicy ripe scents of drying 
grasses and blooming flowers in the boundless 
meadow lands. 

“Stott’s the first man on my list,” she said. 

“And mine, too, Fannie.” 

“He thought he left both of us dead down there 
on Clear Creek that night, Texas.” 

“Did that monstrous scoun’rel lift his hand—” 

“Here—feel here.” She guided his hand to the 
back of her head, where he felt a strip of adhesive 
plaster over a long wound. 

“The houn’ hit you!” 

“I tried to go back and turn you loose.” 

“You pore little lamb! He hit you with his 
gun, didn’t he, Fannie?” 

“My horse ran away when I lopped over in the 
saddle, just sense enough left in me to hang on 
somehow. I think he shot after me—I think I can 
remember shots. Anyhow, I fell off after a while, 


256 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


and the horse went on. I heard Stott go by chasin' 
it, and go back with it. Then I crawled into the 
brush and fainted, I guess, like a regular woman.” 

“How in this merciless world did you ever get out 
of there?” 

“I don’t hardly know, Texas. I knew Stott 
would be back there at daylight to look for me, and 
finish me off if he found me alive, and I remember 
startin’ to run away. When I got my head again 
I was away down in the Nation, miles from that 
place, and it was afternoon. I guess it must have 
been the next day.” 

“And you knew where you was—I’ll bet a purty 
you knew!” 

“Lucky for my skin, I did, Texas. I wasn’t 
more than fifteen miles from Colby’s ranch. I got 
over there about dark. My head was as big as a 
barrel, and my hair so mussed and matted with 
blood and tangles I had Belle whack it off right 
close up to the handle. She stitched up the gap in 
my scalp, and in the morning I was about as usual. 
Oh, well, I was a little fuzzy around the edges, like 
you feel after a drunk. Belle stained me up with 
walnut hulls, and I borrowed a horse and rode up 
here, hoping that I’d find you. And that’s all there 
is to that, Texas.” 

Texas marveled over her escape, and sympa¬ 
thized with her in little soft ejaculations. She in- 


AN UNEXPECTED ALLY 


257 


quired of his own adventures after they parted, and 
he told her all that had overtaken him from that 
time forward. Fannie sat silent a long time when 
he had fiinshed, as if there was something in his 
story that threw her into deep thought. After a 
while: 

“Texas?” 

“Yes, Fannie.” 

“That girl they fired, the one I helped Mackey 
and Stott and that gang hand out the crooked deal 
to—you think a good deal of her, don’t you, 
Texas?” 

“I hold her in the highest of respect—I have a 
very warm, friendly feelin’ for her, Fannie.” 

“Of course you have, Texas, and more than 
that,” she said, as if she had thought it out to an 
indisputable conclusion. “That’s all right—you’ve 
got a right to—she’s a nice kid, you can see it in 
her eyes.” 

“She’s not exactly a kid, Fannie; she’s a woman 
as old as you.” 

“Yes, but she’s a kid in experience. Well, I 
wish to God I was, too! If I was, maybe—” 

She let it stop there, and sat with her chin in her 
hands, her hat on the ground. He could see the 
white strip of adhesive plaster on her head, and 
his compassion for her was as deep as the sea. 

“How do you know I’m square with you, Texas 


258 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


—how do you know I’m not planning to draw you 
into some fresh trouble?” 

“I can’t tell you just how I know, Fannie, but I 
know.” 

“Well, I am square with you. It came to me 
down there on Clear Creek that night that I had to 
be square; that it was the time set for me to part 
company with crooks. I’m through with them; 
they never brought me anything but trouble, any¬ 
how.” 

“No, I don’t reckon it pays out, Fannie.” 

“There’s no use to tell you what my life’s been, 
Texas—you know!” 

“You pore little dove!” 

He spoke with great tenderness, with boundless 
compassion; took her hand and stroked it, as if to 
console her for all that had been denied her in the 
parched ways that she had walked. Fannie bent 
her head to her updrawn knees and sobbed as if 
some great growth of sorrow had suddenly broken 
in her heart. 

Her gust of weeping passed away slowly, only 
coming back now and then in diminishing force, 
like a bitter wind, making her voice shiver when 
she spoke. 

“You’re the only man that ever treated me like I 
was as good as other women,” she said; “the only 
man I ever knew since I was a little girl, it seems 


AN UNEXPECTED ALLY 


259 


to me, that says the same things with eyes and 
words to me at the same time. I’d die for you, 
Texas—I’d die for you, and be glad!” 

Texas was greatly disturbed by her sudden and 
stormy confession. No woman, good or bad, ever 
had gone to such an honest and outspoken length 
with him before, and he had no precedent to guide 
him in the circumstances. But he still held her 
hand and stroked it to comfort her, and make 
amends for what he could not give her out of his 
heart. 

“I couldn’t ever permit you to do that, Miss Fan¬ 
nie,” he said in all seriousness; “I couldn’t begin 
to hear of it!” 

Along the railroad half a mile away he could see 
the bobbing lanterns of the men who were loading 
part of the big drove of Texas cattle. He knew 
that Stott had gone on ahead to Kansas City to 
arrange for the sale of them, and collect for those 
already shipped, and a feeling of impatience came 
up in his breast at the thought of how many days 
it would be before he returned to face the adjust¬ 
ment that he could not now escape. He got up 
with an air of briskness, and drew gently on her 
hand to lift her to her feet. 

“Don’t you think we’d better go now, Fannie? 
You’ll be drug plumb to death, you’ll be so tired.” 

“Sit down, Texas; I haven’t begun to tell you 


260 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


what I’ve got on that gang. We’ve both suffered 
by what they’ve handed us, but it’s our day to talk 
now. Sit down—I’ll tell you something.” 

When they started back to the hotel, Texas could 
read in the Big Dipper that it was close to two 
o’clock. But his weariness had gone from him, his 
troubles had dissolved. He felt like a man who 
had been armed to meet an enemy before whom 
he had stood bare-handed and hopeless a little 
while before. 

Only a few hours since he had walked through 
the streets of Cottonwood in the distrust and con¬ 
tempt of the earth’s mean cowards, such as Ollie 
Noggle, and the accusation of others, a load so 
heavy that it almost broke his heart. The back 
door of that town had stood open to him, and fin¬ 
gers were pointing him out that way between the 
dusk and dawn. 

But it was different now. Confidence was in his 
heart, power in his hand. There would be a smoke 
in that town before long, and the crooks would be 
running ahead of it, like chinch bugs out of a blaz¬ 
ing stubble field. 

Even Mrs. Goodloe had gone to bed when they 
reached the hotel, and there was nobody to place 
Fannie. But Texas knew that half the rooms were 
empty, and one had but to go roaming along the 
hall until he found an open door. That was the 


AN UNEXPECTED ALLY 261 

rule for late arrivals at the Woodbine, known far 
and wide over the range. 

The room next to his own was empty, investiga¬ 
tion disclosed, although a heavy-snoring cow-man 
had inhabited it the night before. Here Texas 
installed his side-partner, to go and sit by his own 
window until dawn, aflame with eagerness to make 
use of the astonishing information which Fannie 
Goodnight had put that night into his hands. 


CHAPTER XIX 


MISUNDERSTANDING 

I T wasn’t nothing but one of them back-breakin’ 
headaches like a woman will git ever so 
often,” Uncle Boley said. “I went up there 
this morning to see how she was, and she met me 
at the door herself, her eyes as big as tea-cups, but 
smilin’, son, smilin’.” 

“She’d smile, sir, I’d bet you a purty, if the last 
drop of blood was bein’ drawn from her veins, 
like that old-time Roman lady, sir, and she’d ’low 
it didn’t hurt a*bit.” 

“I never heard tell of the lady you speak of, son, 
but Sallie McCoy can stand pain and sufferin’ as 
good as any Indian that ever lived. She’s been 
through it; she bends before the wind like a wilier, 
but when the sun comes out you see her standin’ 
straight, maybe with some signs of tears like the 
rain on the willer-leaves, but standin’ straight up 
with her eyes on the sky.” 

“This was different to any trouble she’d ever met 
before, and it must have cut her deeper, Uncle 
Boley, deeper than death and bereavement.” 

“Yes, she always had the highest respect of every- 

262 


MISUNDERSTANDING 


263 


body—oh, well, she has yet, too. Them scoundrels 
a firin’ her out of her job in the school won’t make 
anybody that knows her think the less of her.” 

“She realizes that, sir, I’m sure. But there 
must be a good many newcomers in this town that 
don’t know her. That’s where it’ll hurt. But 
there’s a day of reckonin’ close, sir, mighty close! 
And when it comes, I tell you, Uncle Boley, that 
school-board’ll go down on their knees to her, 
and they’ll take off their hats to me, and stand to 
one side when I go by, and I’ll bet you a purty 
they’ll do it, sir!” 

Uncle Boley was putting .holes through the sole 
of a mighty boot, preparing it for the thread. He 
left his awl standing in the leather, his hammer 
free of his hand on the bench, and looked at Texas 
with sharp, questioning eyes. 

“I thought you looked danged pert and ram¬ 
bunctious for a feller that ain’t got no name or 
fame or character whatsomever, as the lawyer said. 
What’s been happenin’?” 

“Something happened, Uncle Boley, that put me 
in tune like a fiddle, and raised my heart up like 
a bird in the morning. A friend of mine struck 
town last night lookin’ for me, a little Indian feller 
from down in the Nation, Bennie Chouteau by 
name, and he came bearin’ proof that puts the re¬ 
sponsibility for them southern cattle on Henry 


264 THE TRAIL RIDER 

Stott so certain he can’t back out of it to save his 
ornery skin.” 

“Amen!” 

Uncle Boley gave the bench a whack with his 
hammer that made the bottle of blacking on the 
shelf jump, and the finished boots standing there 
in a row shift as if they were setting their heels for 
a jig. 

“Yes, sir; and that ain’t all, it ain’t half—it 
ain’t more than the first word of what that little 
feller knows!” 

“A man can’t hide it—it’ll come up agin him, 
it’ll come up agin him out of the ground!” 

Uncle Boley’s hand trembled as he jerked the 
awl from the boot-sole and held it like a dagger. 

“Miss Sallie’s a cornin’, sir, as I live!” 

Texas rose in embarrassment, pushed back his 
chair, and retreated as far as the partition, where 
he stood with his back against Uncle Boley’s bed¬ 
room door. Few marks of his battle with the cow¬ 
man Sawyer remained on his face that morning, 
where a new animation lighted the severity of its 
lines. Neither was there anything to be ashamed 
of, to draw back and attempt to hide, in his dress, 
which was neat and clean, with a flash of scarlet 
necktie at the collar of his gray woolen shirt, and 
tucked into his bosom as if it sprung from the fire 
of his heart. 


MISUNDERSTANDING 


265 


Yet he looked as if he would have run away if 
he had been given time, as thirsty as his heart was 
for the cool laving of those soft, brown eyes, as 
hungry as his soul for the music of her voice. But 
there was not time for retreat; Sallie was in the 
door. 

She was dressed in white linen, and her face 
was as pale as some religious penitent’s who had 
knelt night-long beside a shrine. The virginal 
sorrow of her eyes struck the heart like a sad soft 
chord from a great, vibrant organ. She paused 
in the door a moment, a packet of papers and letters 
in her hand. 

Uncle Boley rose to greet her in the ceremonious 
way that he always carried toward her, and she 
went forward without hesitation, or reservation, or 
question in her heart, and gave Hartwell her hand. 
Certain now that he was to be neither blasted nor 
scorned, he placed the chair for her, and the little 
shop instantly became for him the most glorious 
place in the world. 

“You wasn’t expectin’ to find this feller here, was 
you?” Uncle Boley asked in the bantering lightness 
so common in the manner of the old toward the 
young. 

“I hoped I’d find Mr. Hartwell here, Uncle 
Boley,” she admitted with frankness, lifting her 
eyes to Hartwell’s face, a flush in her pale cheeks. 


266 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


The fire at once sprang to Hartwell’s own brown, 
homely face, as if it leaped the space between them 
from heart to heart and found congenial fuel there. 

“Well, you had a right to,” said Uncle Boley, 
rather taken aback by her ready confession. 

Texas stood up proudly, his head held high, 
glad that she was not ashamed to have it known 
that she had sought his company, despised as he 
was of men. 

“I was afraid, from what mother said last night, 
that you might be gone, or about to leave, Mr. 
Hartwell. I want to ask you not to leave Cotton¬ 
wood on my account, if there is any reason what¬ 
ever for your staying on.” 

“Thank you, Miss Sallie. I felt so lonesome and 
cussed, and full of blame last night after I’d talked 
with your mother that I just wanted to sneak off 
into a corner somewhere and die like a dog. But 
things have changed around wonderfully since 
then, Miss Sallie. I’ve just got to stay around here 
for a day or two more.” 

“I’m glad it’s coming out right for you.” She 
gave him such a look that his heart melted in him, 
as it felt, with a most delicious pain. “Have the 
cattlemen found out their mistake, Mr. Hartwell?” 

“Not just yet,” said he portentously. “A friend 
of mine—here he comes now.” 

Fannie and Hartwell had arranged between 


MISUNDERSTANDING 


267 


them for a little test on Uncle Boley, for the pur¬ 
pose of learning under the shrewd eyes of that 
sharp-seeing old fellow how well her disguise cov¬ 
ered her indentity. If it was sufficient to pass with 
him, they believed it would hold good anywhere 
in Cottonwood. In the end they intended to take 
him into their confidence, for Hartwell knew that 
he could be trusted to the rim of the world. 

Fannie appeared in the door with a quick, half¬ 
careless, “Hello, Texas,” hat pulled over her eyes, 
very much an Indian in appearance, indeed. She 
was wearing gloves with red stars worked into the 
gauntlets, and spurs with rowels which clicked on 
the floor as she walked. She was a trim figure of a 
cowboy, but not unusual in a field where light¬ 
framed men were the general rule. 

Confident and careless as she appeared there 
when Texas introduced her as his friend Ben 
Chouteau, from the Nation, Fannie had walked in 
shrinking fear between the hotel and Uncle Boley’s 
shop. She dreaded meeting some of the old gang 
who had been the tyrants of her past life of op¬ 
pression, unconscious herself how truly effective 
was her disguise. 

“I wanted you to meet my friend, Uncle Boley,” 
Texas explained, “for we may need your help on 
certain matters of business that we’ve got to clear 
up in this town in the next day or two.” 


268 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


“You can count on me to the last button of my 
jeans, boys. I used to know some Chouteaus up 
by Westport—might you be related to that crowd,” 

“Distantly related,” Fannie replied, speaking in 
a low voice. She felt uncomfortable under the eyes 
of Sallie McCoy, although without reason appar¬ 
ently, for Sallie had opened the Kansas City paper 
and seemed oblivious to all outside its pages. 

“Them folks was French-Indians, and good 
business men, too. I don’t recall now what tribe 
they belonged to, but they all went off to the Nation 
a long time ago.” 

“My people are Shawnees,” said Fannie, sure of 
herself there, for it was entirely true. 

Sallie McCoy turned her eyes upward to look 
over the top of the paper as Fannie spoke, and sat 
studying the masquerader a moment. Fannie stood 
with her back to Sallie, facing Uncle Boley across 
the little counter, Texas over by the door. 

From where he stood Hartwel^ watched Sallie’s 
behavior with alarm, for her close reading of the 
paper was only a sham and a pretense to cover her 
close scrutiny of the stranger from the Nation. 
When Fannie was not speaking, Sallie’s eyes were 
decorously on the paper; when she spoke, they 
lifted, although the position of her face did not 
change. But there was nothing of suspicion, won¬ 
der, even curiosity in the look which she swept over 


MISUNDERSTANDING 


269 


Fannie Goodnight’s back. It was more like the 
indefinable, knowledge-gathering stare of a little 
girl. 

‘“IVe made boots for lots of them big Indians 
down there,” said Uncle Boley; “them ranchers 
along just below the line. They used to come up 
here regular, but in the last year or so they’ve been 
givin’ me the go-by.” 

He named over several, all of whom Fannie 
knew, and added some detail to what the old man 
had said to prove the genuineness of her acquain¬ 
tance. This pleased Uncle Boley mightily; it was 
the same as meeting an old friend. And Fannie 
was glad that such a safe vein had been opened for 
her to follow. It relieved her of the necessity of 
facing about and talking to Sallie McCoy, whose 
cool brown eyes she seemed to feel looking through 
her, right down to the end of her last pitiful secret, 
and despising them all. 

Texas was growing so uneasy that he was be¬ 
ginning to sweat. He wanted to pass a hint to 
Fannie to go, and stood shifting his weight from 
leg to leg, debating whether it wouldn’t be the 
most honest thing to take Sallie into the secret then 
and there, thus relieving the suspicion that he saw 
growing up in her mind. But doubt over Sallie’s 
readiness to accept on such short notice, and under 
such peculiar conditions, the girl who had been a 


270 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


party to defrauding her out of her victory in the 
roping contest, held him back. 

Fannie managed to break out of Uncle Boley’s 
windy grasp at last. She turned to Texas with a 
hasty word that she must go. She shook hands 
with Uncle Boley, and from the door nodded 
good-by to Sallie, who inclined her head, her eyes 
lifting for a flash from the paper, and dropping 
instantly again to her reading. 

“Nice kid,” said Uncle Boley, “and a youngster, 
from his talk.” 

“Yes, sir, quite young, sir,” said Texas, drawing 
a long breath for the first time in ten minutes as 
Fannie passed the window and was gone from 
sight. 

Sallie folded her paper, gathered her mail, got 
up, and stood looking Texas Hartwell in the eyes 
as straight as if she aimed a rifle to shoot him dead. 
Her face was colorless, her eyes full of indignant 
fire. 

“Mr. Hartwell, I don’t believe there is any reason 
whatever, sir, for you to remain in Cottonwood an¬ 
other hour! The best thing—the manliest thing— 
you can do will be to take the first train that passes, 
no matter which way it goes! ” 

She passed him, holding her skirt back for fear 
the hem of it might brush him, and almost darted 
out of the door, and away. Uncle Boley leaned 


MISUNDERSTANDING 


271 


over the counter and looked after her, his beard 
working, his mouth open, but no sound coming out 
of him in that moment of greatest astonishment of 
his long and crowded years. 

Texas was little less winded, although astonish¬ 
ment over her action was not among his emotions. 
Too well he knew the cause of her sudden scorn. 
The high feeling of pride that lately had warmed 
him and lifted him to the clouds was gone; his hope 
had collapsed in one swift word. The sun seemed 
to have gone under a cloud, the noise out of life 
and the world. 

“Well, what in the hell!” said Uncle Boley. 

“Sir, I’ve gone and mussed it all up again!” said 
Texas miserably. “That wasn’t any man that was 
in here a minute ago, Uncle Boley; it was a girl 
dressed up like one, and she knew it! ” 

“A girl? What do you mean trickin’ Sallie? 
What girl, damn it all, what girl?” 

“Fannie Goodnight, sir. We wanted—” 

Uncle Boley stood rolling his head from side to 
side as if he had been struck with a mortal pain. 
He groaned, eyes closed, hands clasping his head 
like an old Jew mourning beside the temple wall. 

“She knew it, sir—she knew it from the first 
look! I’d give my heart out of my body if I could 
undo what’s done, Uncle Boley!” 

“Any fool can say that after he’s kicked over the 


272 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


mush! Well, you’ve done it now, you’ve fixed 
yourself with her for good. I don’t blame her, you 
keepin’ that girl down there at the hotel under false 
pretenses—” 

“I’m not keeping her, sir! She’s payin’ her 
way; I ain’t got—” 

“In your room, under pretext she’s a man!” 

“No such a thing, sir, Uncle Boley, sir!” 

Texas was so vehement in his denial that he was 
almost wild. He swung his long arms, and 
slammed his hat down on the counter as if stripping 
himself to fight. 

“Well, maybe not in the same room, but it looks 
just as bad to Sallie.” 

“She’ll think I brought her up here to parade 
before her face! ” 

“Yes, and worse than that. No man can imagine 
the things a woman can think when she believes 
somebody else has crowded her out of his heart.” 

“There’s not room even for a ghost to come in 
there beside Miss Sallie edgeways, Uncle Boley.” 

“You’ll have a gay old time makin’ her believe 
you.” 

“I’ll never have even the show of doin’ it!” 

“What’d that darned Fannie want to go puttin’ 
on britches for and paradin’ herself around?” 

“Uncle Boley, she wouldn’t dare to show her face 
in this town in her own clothes. Stott thinks he 


MISUNDERSTANDING 273 

killed her down there on Clear Creek the night of 
the raid—she’s got a gash three inches long on the 
back of her head where he hit her with his gun.” 

“Say, is that so?” 

Uncle Boley began to see through it like a rea¬ 
sonable man. Texas told him the facts in the mat¬ 
ter, and how Fannie had come there in that disguise 
to find him. Before he was very far into the story 
the old man’s face was glowing with admiration, 
and when he concluded Uncle Boley put out his 
hand in token that his belief and his friendship re¬ 
mained unshaken. 

“I hope to see you two turn that feller Stott over 
like a snappin’ turtle left on his back in the road.” 

“It will be done, Uncle Boley. And when it’s 
done I’ll set my foot on the road to go—I’ll not 
have anything to stay around here for any more.” 

“If you’re thinkin’ about Sallie, I reckon not.” 

“I meant well—you can tell her when I’m gone 
that I meant well; but I kind of always tangled my 
feet up in the rope.” 

“You didn’t have no call to fetch that girl up 
here to test her on me. I’d ’a’ took you? word for 
it, Texas.” 

“I know it, sir.” 

“But it looks like things is shaped and set, and 
a man can’t go around ’em, no matter which way 
he dodges. I guess it was laid out for this thing 


274 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


to come between you and Sallie. Well, a girl that’ll 
do what Fannie tried to do for you ain’t the worst 
kind a man could hitch up to; I don’t care what 
mistakes she’s made before.” 

' “Her wings are singed, Uncle Boley, but her 
heart’s as good as they make ’em.” 

Uncle Boley went to his bench and took up his 
work. He drove holes and he stitched, with his 
wax-end on his beard, and said nothing for a long 
time. Texas stood in the door, his temples throb¬ 
bing, his world absolutely empty. Even the great 
work ahead of him seemed to have no purpose and 
no flavor now. But it must be finished, giving him 
a clean passport when he should turn his face away 
from that place to come back no more. 

“It’ll strike deep in Sallie,” Uncle Boley said in 
time. “I don’t think she’ll ever overlook this. 
Well, I’m sorry. I had hopes I’d see you two set¬ 
tled down here, where maybe I could go to lay my 
head among them that cared for me when my time 
came at last.” 

“I’m sorry, Uncle Boley, from the bottom of my 
heart.” 

But the words had a perfunctory sound in his 
own ear as he spoke, and he knew there could be 
no consolation in them for Uncle Boley. Texas 
lingered on a little while in the shop, and then left 


MISUNDERSTANDING 275 

to wander off over the prairie, where he could be 
alone with his troubles under the sky. 

Late in the afternoon he visited the bank to in¬ 
quire after Stott’s return. To his satisfaction he 
learned that the banker would come home on the 
early morning train. 


CHAPTER XX 


A DAY OF RECKONING 

S TOTT was at his desk early, for banking- 
hours ran long in Cottonwood. After the 
habit of bankers, who seem to be so eager 
that the world see what they are doing, when in 
reality so little of it is ever known, Stott’s desk was 
near the one window in the front of the brick build¬ 
ing on the corner. 

This was a low structure, built especially for the 
bank, and it was an ugly and uninviting place for 
any man to enter and leave his money. The word 
“Bank” was cut into the limestone lintel of the 
door, and painted again in gilt across the win¬ 
dow near which Stott displayed his financial 
prowess. 

As seen from the street that morning, Henry Stott 
was a figure to inspire a sense of solidity, even if 
one could read no deeper at a passing glance 
through his gilt-adorned window-pane. He was a 
large man, at work without a coat, heavy suspenders 
over his white shirt, no necktie to his collar; a man 
of pasty-whiteness, of broad, soft face, and small 
eyes placed so far apart that they looked as if 
276 


A DAY OF RECKONING 277 

nature had designed them for watching both sides 
of the fence at once. 

Banking in that part of the country in those days 
was a game of chance for both the bank and its 
patrons. A gambling-house was a safer and surer 
business for the man that owned it, and the chances 
were about even between the two institutions when 
it came to profit and surety for the patrons. It was 
a significant fact that more banks than gambling- 
houses failed in the cattle country in those times. 

But, unpromising as the bank appeared, and un¬ 
couth as the banker, large transactions were the 
daily rule within those uninviting walls. Loans of 
a hundred thousand dollars had been no unusual 
thing in the experience of Henry Stott, short loans 
at that, with interest as high as ten per centum 
monthly. 

Cattlemen in a hole were glad to accept his hard 
conditions until they could turn their stock, and 
consider it a favor. When they sold, their money, 
such as remained to them, went on deposit in Stott’s 
bank, to be loaned out to others on the same un¬ 
stable security. The risks were big for the banker, 
and his profits probably justified thereby. 

So there was no lack of money in the squat little 
bank, no matter what day or hour you might come 
to it, and no unusual sight, indeed, to see a cattle¬ 
man get off the train from Kansas City, walk into 


278 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


the bank, open his old, battered gripsack, and pile 
up seventy-five or eighty thousand dollars for de¬ 
posit as carelessly as some of us would handle col¬ 
lars. Those were the days on the range when men 
made money in a hurry when they made it, and lost 
it on the jump when it began to go. There wasn’t 
any plodding, slow-going medium road for a faint¬ 
hearted man. 

There were but two people regularly engaged in 
the bank besides Stott, the bookkeeper and receiving¬ 
paying teller. Neither of these had arrived when 
Texas Hartwell and Fannie Goodnight walked in 
through the wide-swung door and confronted Stott 
at his desk. A revolver lay on the desk within 
Stott’s instant grasp, a rifle leaned against the wall 
not three feet away, and he seemed to hesitate be¬ 
tween them as his early visitors drew up to the 
railing behind which he sat. 

Stott was facing the door, and, as his hand crept 
now stealthily toward his revolver weighting the 
pile of papers at his side, his eyes sought the street 
as if for the waiting horses, or accomplices, of the 
two who had appeared so unexpectedly. 

“It isn’t a raid, Mr. Stott, sir,” Texas hastened 
to assure him. “We’ve come to talk over a matter 
of business with you.” 

“Well, what can I do for you?” Stott asked, his 


A DAY OF RECKONING 279 

ludicrous, high, metallic voice in absurd keeping 
with his bulk. 

He looked them over sharply, sure of Texas at 
the first glance, as his expression betrayed, but al¬ 
together at sea regarding Fannie, who had added 
colored spectacles to her disguise. 

“I see you know me,” Texas said. 

“I was just wonderin’ if I did,” Stott replied, 
affably enough, and apparently at ease, “but you’ve 
got me.” 

“It was night-time when we met, and you 
couldn’t see my face, but from what you said at 
that time, sir, I was sure you knew who you were 
ropin’ up.” 

A little color came into Stott’s face as Texas 
spoke, but he laughed with a show of good humor, 
like a man who appreciates the spirit of a joke, 
even though he doesn’t understand it. 

“I guess I don’t belong to your lodge,” he 
said. 

As he spoke his fingers were tapping the stock of 
his revolver paper-weight, and his quick little eyes 
were following every movement of foot and hand 
of the pair before him. 

“We came in on you early, Mr. Stott, to save 
makin’ these explanations before folks, and we 
haven’t got time to trifle away on useless introduc- 


280 THE TRAIL RIDER 

tions. You know me, and you know who’s with 
me.” 

“We’ve come to talk over old times with you, 
Henry—away back old times.” 

In spite of his stolidity Stott’s face changed at 
Fannie’s first word. He jumped to his feet, re¬ 
volver in hand. 

“Get to hell out of here!” he ordered. 

“You’d better put down that gun, Henry,” Fan¬ 
nie cautioned with reproachful scorn. 

“You can’t come in here and work any of your 
blackmail on me!” 

“Sir, we’re not even goin’ to try it.” 

Texas had drawn back a step from the railing. 
He stood with his hand on his gun, every muscle 
of his body set. 

“Get to hell out of here!” Stott repeated, his re¬ 
volver lifted as if to fire a signal. Texas made a 
little motion of caution, an eloquent command of 
restraint, with his left hand, the other on his pistol- 
stock. 

“Put down that gun, sir!” he ordered. “We’re 
not intendin’ to rob you—we’re after a settlement 
of another kind.” 

Stott was purple in the congestion of rage and 
fright. His moment had gone, and he seemed to 
realize it, for the weapon in his hand wavered. He 
made an indecisive movement as if to put it down, 


A DAY OF RECKONING 281 

another as if to point it toward the ceiling and fire. 
But his moment had passed. 

If he had fired it on the impulse he could have 
carried it for an attempt to rob the bank, and no 
testimony to the contrary ever would have convinced 
the public of Cottonwood. Besides that, there 
wouldn’t have been anybody left to testify. Now 
it was too late to summon help, and Stott knew it. 
Texas had not drawn his gun; Fannie had not even 
put her hand to the weapon she wore. A banker 
couldn’t rise up and give the alarm of thieves every 
time armed men came in his door, for eight out of 
ten of his customers wore guns. 

“We want to talk Southern cattle for a minute, 
for one thing, unless you’d rather we’d talk it over 
with Duncan and the association,” Texas said, a 
politeness in his voice that he did not feel in his 
heart. 

Stott threw the gun down with a jerk of the head, 
in the manner of a man who yields to pressure 
against his judgment. 

“Well, what do you want?” 

“A little dab of justice,” Texas said. “Your 
clerk’s just stepped in next door for his morning 
snort, and he’ll be here direc’ly. When he comes, 
you tell him we’re goin’ to your private room back 
yonder to talk over a deal. There’ll not be any 
shootin’, and there’ll not be any cussin’ and snortin’, 


282 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


Mr. Stott, sir, unless you start it up yourself.” 

The teller came in before Texas had finished 
speaking; a little wrinkled old man, wearing his 
hat with juvenile tilt over his left ear, walking in a 
veritable alcoholic fog. Stott addressed him as 
“major,” with a word about the business ahead, and 
lei the way to his private room, with “President” 
painted on its door. Texas closed the door after 
them. 

Stott threw back the top of his desk with a clat¬ 
ter, and sat down, facing them, with his thick hands 
spread on his thighs, a surly defiance in his face. 

“Accordin’ to your intentions both of us ought 
to be dead down in the brush on Clear Creek,” 
Texas said. 

Stott leaned back in his chair, clasping his hands 
behind his head, as if he had suddenly thrown away 
his worry and his ill-humor along with it, and 
had settled down into his unruffled business front. 

“How far do you suppose your word would go 
against mine with the cattlemen on this range?” 
he wanted to know. 

“I don’t count,” Texas admitted. “That’s why 
I’m here to send you out to talk for me.” 

“You’re a slick pair!” Stott sneered. “Now 
you’re here, say something.” 

“One way or another, I aim to say enough to 
satisfy you, Mr. Stott.” 


283 


A DAY OF RECKONING 

Fannie had dropped wearily into a chair and 
taken off her hat. She sat looking up at Texas, 
who stood before Stott in the dignity of his clean 
life and clean conscience, a superman compared 
with the gross, heavy-feeding banker. If there was 
admiration in her eyes, surely it was justified; and 
confidence, certainly it was not altogether mis¬ 
placed. 

Stott looked at her, a sneering smile lifting his 
thick lip. 

“Fannie, what’re you goin’ to tell them?” he 
asked in a manner of friendly banter. 

“I’ll tell enough to crack your neck, you swill- 
guzzler ! ” 

Stott’s anger burned up his caution in a flash. 
He unclasped his thick hands, leveling a finger 
at her face, a vile name on his tongue. 

“You and Mackey went into this to hold me up! ” 
he charged. 

Fannie leaned toward him, her face dark with 
the flush that sprang into it, holding out one hand 
to stop Texas, who had started at the name which 
Stott had applied to her as if he would turn it back 
down the foul lane of his throat. 

“I went into it to draw a card to fill the hand I 
waited a long time to play against you, Henry Stott. 
It wasn’t because Johnnie Mackey—” 

“And you threw both of us down for this Texas 


284 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


rattler! If Mackey’s half the man I think he is 
he’ll cut your throat for that little trick!” 

“He’s not even that much of a man! ” 

“I’m sorry I didn’t—” 

“Let me talk a minute, Henry,” said Fannie, 
something of her old sauciness in her manner, 
broken in spirit as she seemed to be. “Ever since 
I began to help Mackey shove his counterfeit money 
and raised bills, I’ve been holding a hand against 
you, waiting for the day when I was ready to make 
a big clean-up and quit.” 

“You never had anything on me, you little—” 

“Johnnie’s not much of a man, but he will stand 
by his friends—up to a certain time,” she con¬ 
tinued, unmoved by Stott’s interruption. “We 
fussed over it the night before I went down there to 
help you trap Texas. Johnnie tried to kill me that 
time. I was afraid of the little devil after that.” 

Stott rolled his head, laughed a little, played with 
a pencil on his desk. He seemed rather amused 
by this attempt to trouble the waters of his security. 

“I never trusted Mackey, even when we were as 
thick as we could be mixed, for he’s a man that will 
throw anybody to save himself, and I started out 
early to get a cinch on him that I could twist when 
the time came. I got it, Henry.” 

“Well, go an’ hold Irm up,” Stott suggested 
mockingly. 


A DAY OF RECKONING 


285 


“Mackey was afraid to use what he had on you, 
and I was satisfied to hold off on it as long as I 
didn’t need the money. When you started him up 
in business here, Johnnie considered things square 
between him and you.” 

“I never started him up in business here, or any¬ 
where else,” Stott declared, red with his vehemence. 

“Johnnie was satisfied, he was making ten dol¬ 
lars to your one. I got to thinking the hand I held 
against you never would be any good, and I was 
glad enough to draw another to fill. I’m full now; 
I hold a royal flush.” 

“And the settlement you’re going to make to-day, 
sir,” said Texas very gently, his voice low and well 
controlled, “goes back to the time Mackey raised 
that six-thousand-dollar note of Ed McCoy’s for 
you to read sixty thousand, the very day you mur¬ 
dered McCoy with your own hand.” 

“You’re a liar!” said Stott, springing to his feet, 
his face as white as the dead. “I’ll make you prove 
it!” 

“You’d better set down and keep cool,” Texas 
advised. 

“Do you realize what it means to charge a man 
with murder?” Stott demanded. His hand shook 
as he gripped the back of his chair. 

“To the last word I do, Mr. Stott.” 

“I’ll hand you over to the sheriff—I’ll make you 


286 THE TRAIL RIDER 

sweat for this dirty attempt to blackmail me!” 

“If you’re still in that notion five minutes from 
now, go and do it, sir.” 

Fannie stepped in front of Stott as he moved as 
if to leave the room in his high and virtuous heat. 

“You can call the devil when we’re through with 
you, Stott,” she said. 

“If Mackey’s in this—” 

“Mackey left Cottonwood last night, sir.” 

“We had a session with him yesterday afternoon, 
Henry. He sold his joint to Jud Springer last 
night.” 

Stott sat down again. Every word they said 
seemed to drive him a little lower, until he leaned 
forward, his head down, an ungainly, dispirited 
lump. 

“Zeb Smith is drunk this morning, and locked up 
in a safe place,” Texas added, speaking close to 
Stott’s ear, as if in confidence. “He’ll keep where 
he is without any sheriff.” 

“After you went to all that expense to have the 
wrong man killed, Henry,” Fannie mocked, “and 
old Zeb came back to hold you up again.” 

“He’s ready to go into court and swear he saw 
you shoot Ed McCoy. Now, if you want to fetch 
sheriffs into this case, sir, you can go right on and 
do it.” 


A DAY OF RECKONING 287 

Stott sat up with a sudden wrench, making his 
chair complain. 

“Nobody in this country would believe that 
drunken bum on oath, any more than they would 
you two buzzards! ” he declared, seeming to gather a 
breath of new courage. 

“It might be that a jury in a court-room wouldn’t 
take much stock in him, sir, but a jury of cattlemen 
on the open range is a different set of men,” said 
Texas very solemnly. “Mackey wasn’t willing to 
take the chance, and he was only your hired hand.” 

“You can’t prove it—you can’t prove a word of 
it!” 

“But we can prove southern cattle on you to a 
fare-you-well.” 

Stott sat in heavy meditation a little while, the 
two who had brought him to such unexpected and 
heavy judgment waiting silently by. 

“It’s blackmail—I’ll never pay it! ” he muttered. 

“You couldn’t hire us to touch a cent of your 
money, Stott,” Texas corrected him, his voice like 
the word of judgment in the banker’s ear. 

“Then what do you want?” Stott appealed, lift¬ 
ing his miserable face, staring at them in a dumb 
wonder, turning his glance from one to the other 
of that unaccountable pair. 

“There’s an old debt that’s stood cryin’ to your 


288 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


deaf ears many a day, Mr. Stott/’ Texas reminded 
him, “and this is the time you’ll listen to its de¬ 
mands.” 

“What do you mean, Hartwell?” 

“I mean the difference between six thousand le¬ 
gal debt and sixty thousand forged, with inter-ust 
from that day to this.” 

“You can’t prove it!” said Stott again, weakly. 
“It can’t be proved!” 

“You might as well call it sixty thousand, to 
make it look better. We’ll let you put any kind of 
a face to it you can think up, Stott, to save you in 
front of the world on that. You can send for Mrs. 
McCoy and count the cash money down in her 
hand, and tell her it’s your gratitude for past favors 
done you by Ed McCoy, or that it’s your heart 
moved by your great prosperity, or that you’ve got 
religion—or anything you want to tell her. That 
done, we cross off your crime and let you free on 
murder.” 

Stott sat thinking it over. Perhaps the turn that 
things took when they scorned his money put a 
newer and graver complexion on their case in his 
eyes; doubtless he realized that he couldn’t make 
the plea of blackmail stick against them before the 
public. On their part, taking Mackey’s skulking 
retreat into consideration, they could ruin him in 
an hour. 


A DAY OF RECKONING 


289 


By the payment of the money to Mrs. McCoy as 
demanded by this unfathomable Texas stranger, 
his position would be strengthened against the 
shock of the cattlemen’s discovery of his duplicity 
in running in the Texas herd. The glow of public 
approbation of such a deed would be warm and 
profitable. It would be almost worth the money— 
if these two dangerous people were out of the way. 

There were many things for Stott to consider, in¬ 
deed, in those hard-pressing moments. But behind 
all the argument that he could bring up to support 
a denial, plain and final, of their demand, stood the 
panic of his own guilty heart which cried out that 
no sacrifice was too dear to buy immunity from this 
ruinous exposure. 

“What guarantee,” he asked, with his business 
caution, “will I have, if I do what you say, that 
you’ll get out of the country and keep still?” 

“There are conditions to add, sir, before any 
guarantee at all will be given,” Texas told him. 
“First, do what I tell you—send for Mrs. McCoy 
and pay her sixty thousand dollars, cash money. 
You brought back more than that with you this 
morning from the sale of that first bunch of south¬ 
ern cattle. Mrs. McCoy is at Uncle Boley Drum- 
goole’s shop, waitin’ on your message, sir.” 

“So you’ve told it all!” 

Stott looked up sharply, his words the yelp of 


290 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


a beaten whelp. There stood in his face the ghost 
of his guilty years, the specter that had haunted 
him with the dread of discovery since the day of 
his cowardly shot in the prairie silences, with the 
unseen Zeb Smith lying low behind a sumac-clump. 

“She don’t know anything about it, sir, nor what 
she’s there for. Send for her; we’ll leave it to you 
to deal square with her, believin’ that it will be 
done.” 

“All right, Hartwell,” Stott agreed, nodding his 
heavy head, the fright of his cowardly soul almost 
shriveling his gross body, “I promise you I’ll deal 
it straight to Ed McCoy’s women—I’ll deal it 
straight.” 

“When you’ve paid her, cash money in hand, and 
refused to take a cent of it back on deposit in this 
bank if she offers it to you, you’ll send word to 
Malcolm Duncan, or carry it to him yourself, that 
will clear me of the charge of sellin’ out my honor 
and trust to the men that brought that southern 
herd up and run it over me, sir.” 

“Hartwell, I’ll hand you five thousand dollars if 
you’ll let things stand like they are on that, and 
leave the country.” 

Stott begged it of him abjectly, holding out his 
guilty hands. 

Hartwell drew back a step hurriedly, away from 


A DAY OF RECKONING 


291 


the possible contamination of Stott’s unholy touch. 

“You’ll do what I set for you to do,” he said 
sternly, “and bring back results within twenty-four 
hours, or you’ll answer to me with your life!” 


CHAPTER XXI 


THE DARK HORIZON 

H ARTWELL and Fannie loitered along 
the street until they saw the bank teller 
leave Uncle Boley’s shop with Mrs. Mc¬ 
Coy; turned and walked back toward the bank after 
they had passed on the other side, and waited in 
that vicinity until the widow came out with the 
package in her hand. 

Mrs. McCoy held straight for Uncle Boley’s 
shop, walking rapidly. They followed, well be¬ 
hind her, and stood in front of Noggle’s barber¬ 
shop, a little way down the street, waiting for her 
to leave. She had been in the shop but a minute 
when Uncle Boley came hurrying out, bare-headed, 
his beard broken loose from under his suspenders 
and flying in the wind. He looked round him this 
way and that, like a man who hears a swarm of 
bees, his hoary face tipped up to the sky. 

Presently he popped back into the shop, only to 
come out again at once with his hat on and repeat 
his queer weather-observation antics. Texas stood 
enjoying the old soul’s excited maneuvers, not fully 
understanding what they meant, but he believed 
292 


THE DARK HORIZON 


293 


part of them related to a search of the heavens for 
the Angel Gabriel, part of them to a mundane ex¬ 
ploration of the environs for himself. 

“We’ll go in here,” he said. 

Texas was in no mood for receiving either the 
credit or the thanks of Uncle Boley and Mrs. 
McCoy. He never wanted to be known in the 
transaction if he could keep his part in it covered, 
and the thought that it might come out on him be¬ 
fore he could get away from Cottonwood made him 
cross. He cared little whether Noggle wanted his 
custom in that shop or not. 

Noggle was contemplating the reflection of his 
own charms in the glass, adding a little powder 
here, smoothing an eyebrow there, giving a turn to 
the end of his long mustache with his beautiful 
soft fingrs. He turned with a hand still at the 
curling end of that adornment, to see who was 
breaking in upon his preening hour for a shave. 

“Bennie, sit down and read the paper till I’m 
through,” Texas directed. 

“Good merning,” said Noggle, pronouncing the 
good old word with a gimlet-hole sound. There 
would have been no distinction in saying it like 
everybody else in Cottonwood, and no style. 

“Hi’re you, sir?” Texas returned, his fingers busy 
with his cravat, his coat already on the hook. “I 
want a hair-cut and shave.” 


294 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


He spread himself out in the chair, and Noggle 
stood by as if he teetered on indecision. 

“All right,” he yielded at last, “all right. But 
it hurts a man’s business—” 

“Damn your fool business, sir!” said Texas, 
lifting his head savagely. 

Noggle shrank back from him, pressing his hand 
to his mouth as if he had bitten his tongue. Over 
in the corner, where she stood looking at the cigar¬ 
ette cards tacked to the wall, Fannie laughed. 

Noggle began to snip round the edges of Hart¬ 
well’s long hair with his shears, pausing now and 
then to tap them on the back of the comb, for no 
apparent reason in the barbering world. Noggle 
could not be expected to hold silence very long, not 
even while clipping an undesirable customer, espe¬ 
cially when he was itching all over inside with big 
news. But it was along toward the end of the hair¬ 
trimming that he melted enough to begin. 

“Cowboy in here from the Diamond Tail this 
morning said the Texas fever’s broke out over 
there,” said he. 

“That so?” 

Texas spoke as if the news was of little concern 
to him, but Fannie turned with a sharp exclama¬ 
tion, looking at Noggle with big eyes. 

“Lost twenty-odd two days ago,” he said, “and 
spreadin’ like fire.” 


THE DARK HORIZON 


295 


“Too bad/’ said Texas, unmoved. 

Noggle clipped on, nodding over Hartwell’s head 
at Fannie, whose interest made her a better mark. 

“Clean ’em out if it keeps on spreading they say, 
and make hard times here in the Arkansaw Valley. 
Well, the beauty of my business is, a man can pick 
up and foiler the money.” 

“Did you say he was from the Diamond Tail?’’ 
Fannie asked. 

“Yes, that’s Sawyer’s brand, you know. He said 
it was spreadin’ in on the Open Hat, too. I guess 
somebody oncorked a bottle of hornets when they 
drove them Texas cattle in here!” 

Nobody offered any word to combat or agree with 
the assertion. Noggle pressed his subject back into 
the chair and began to rub the lather into his chin, 
keeping time to the movement with his foot like a 
man playing a banjo. 

“I wouldn’t like to stand in the shoes of the man 
who was to blame for them tick-bringin’ cattle git- 
tin’ on this range,” he said. “Cowboy that was in 
here from the Diamond Tail—I give him a hair¬ 
cut, shave, shampoo, massage, and singe—said the 
cow-men was cornin’ in here in a day or two to 
look for the feller and handle him around some. 
If I knew who that man was I’d tip it off to him, 
as a friend, so he could make his gitaway.” 

“You’re very kind and generous, sir,” said 


296 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


Texas, pushing Noggle’s finger and thumb away 
from the hold on his upper lip; “and if I happen 
to meet the feller you speak of I’ll pass the word on 
to him.” 

“A man owes something to a feller that’s stood 
up for him,” said the barber, but looking about 
him and craning his long neck to sweep the street 
and make sure that his words would not be heard 
by anybody through the open door; “and I’m one 
of the kind that remembers my friends, no matter 
if my business is apt to suffer by it.” 

“No man’s business ever suffered very long be¬ 
cause he had the honor to do what was right,” Texas 
assured him, his opinion of the barber rising a 
considerable degree. 

“I sent for Malvina and told her to pass the tip 
on to that feller if she saw him.” 

“You’re a sport, Nick!” said Fannie warmly. 

Noggle suspended his operations, razor lifted 
high, to look at her, a cast of hauteur on his narrow 
face. 

“Time for you to begin shavin’, if you’re ever 
goin’ to, kid,” said he. 

“I shave with a hot wagon-tire,” Fannie said, 
turning to study the cigarette pictures again. 

“Yes, and there’s one feller in this town I’d like 
to shave with my six-shooter!” 


297 


THE DARK HORIZON 

Noggle looked steadily at Fannie, his chin thrust 
out, his powdered forehead wrinkled in a scowl. 
Perhaps he was trying the effect on her of an ex¬ 
pression of fierceness which he had studied out be¬ 
fore his mirror. If so, it looked as if he’d have 
to design a new one, for Fannie only laughed at 
him and turned her back. 

“If you’re hintin’ at Zeb Smith, I can lead you 
to him,” Texas offered. 

“I don’t want bloodshed, I don’t want to git 
mixed up in any more of it if I can help it,” said 
Noggle, as if his past had been drenched with the 
sanguinary fluid that waters human hearts, “but I 
ain’t a goin’ to hide out from no man, neither.” 

“I’ll send him down to the shop, if it will oblige 
you any, sir.” 

“Don’t you do it, don’t you do it!” Noggle pro¬ 
tested with undignified haste. 

“If you don’t wish it, sir—” 

“I don’t want to muss up the shop.” 

It takes a bluffer to color a thing like that with 
the significance, the unexpressed ferocity, that gives 
it weight. Noggle had practiced the art a long 
time; there wasn’t a match for him between the 
Arkansas and the Rio Grande, with Zeb Smith in 
the contest. 

“Yes, sir, I reckon they’ll be some ground tore 


298 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


up and bushes bent down the day you two meet,” 
said Texas gravely, his hand in his pocket for the 
fee. 

“Your money ain’t good here,” said Noggle gen¬ 
erously. 

“Sir, I insist on—” 

“It don’t pass in this shop, Texas. You know, 
there’ll be a up-train at two ten, and a down-one at 
four nineteen. Or if you didn’t want to wait that 
long, you might buy a horse.” 

“Yes, sir, I reckon it could be done.” 

“You could sell him up at Wichita, you know.” 

“I guess I might be able to sell him up there,” 
said Texas, his head bent thoughtfully, his hand 
still in his pocket; “but I’ll not have any need, 
thank you, sir. I’ll be around here a day or two 
more.” 

On the street Texas faced toward Uncle Boley’s 
shop. 

“I’ll go on down to the hotel,” said Fannie. 

“Uncle Boley he’ll be wantin’ to see you, Fannie.” 

“I’m not going up there, I tell you!” She spoke 
sharply, a surge of blood in her dark-stained face. 

“You don’t need to mind Uncle Boley,” he per¬ 
suaded. 

Fannie stood rasping her spur over the end of a 
board in the sidewalk, stubbornly refusing to lift 
her head. 


THE DARK HORIZON 299 

“That McCoy kid’ll be up there, suckin’ a stick 
of candy!” she said. 

“Why, Miss Fannie!” 

“Oh, it’s all right, Texas—go on up and see 
her,” she said, her voice trembling, her face turned 
away. “She’s a good kid, I haven’t got anything 
against her. Go on up and see her if you want 
to.” 

“Fannie, you mustn’t think that way about me. 
Miss McCoy can’t be anything in this world to 
me.” 

“You care for her—you care a whole lot for 
her!” 

“Her way and mine, Fannie—” 

“I gave you my cards and you played them for 
her —you thought of her all the time!” 

“You didn’t want me to hold Stott up—that 
would have been blackmail, Fannie.” 

“You held him up for her!” 

“That wasn’t a hold-up, it was restitution. Stott 
owed them; he didn’t owe you and me anything 
that money would pay.” 

Fannie thought it over a little while, then she 
turned frankly to him, her hand extended, a smile 
on her lips, a struggle in her throat to hold down 
the tears. 

“I know it, Texas. I’ve run with crooks so long 
I can’t see straight all at once.” 


300 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


“You’re all right, Fannie; you’re as straight as 
a plumb-line.” 

“No, money wouldn’t square what Stott owes you 
and me, Texas. I guess we’ll have to cross that 
off—if I’m going to stay square.” 

“We’ve got to cross off a lot of things in this 
world,” sighed he. 

“Yes, when you stand clean and think square, 
I guess you have, kid. You’re clean—it isn’t hard 
for you. So is that girl with the big brown eyes. 
Maybe if I was—” 

“You’re as square as a die!” he protested. 

“Oh, go on up and see her! ” said Fannie crossly. 

There were not many people in the street at that 
hour of the forenoon, and the few who passed be¬ 
hind them where they stood on the edge of the side¬ 
walk facing into the street heeded them no more 
than they would have any pair of cowboys. They 
were as much alone, indeed, as they would have 
been in seclusion, as far as public notice was con¬ 
cerned. Texas put his hand on her shoulder and 
looked into her face. 

“Fannie, there’s no reason why I should go to 
Uncle Boley’s, not any more at all, as I know of. 
We’ll go back to the ho- tel, and set down and talk 
things over, for our roads are beginning to stretch 
out from the forks, and we’ll be ridin’ our ways, far 
apart, di-rec’ly.” 


THE DARK HORIZON 


301 


Again Texas saw that convulsive struggle in her 
throat, and her head was bent, her face turned from 
him, as if she was ashamed to let him see that there 
were tears on her cheeks, and her eyes half-blinded 
in their hot rain. 

“All right, Texas,” she said. 

When they came to the hotel, Texas stopped, his 
shoulders back, his chin lifted, as if he turned his 
face up to feel the rain after a drought. The 
strong southern breeze lifted his broad hat-brim. 

“The wind’s blowin’ right up from Taixas this 
morning; you can taste the taste of home in it,” said 
he. “Wouldn’t you like to take a little walk on 
out a-past the houses, Fannie, where it can come 
to you clean?” 

For answer she started forward, and he walked 
beside her, looking now and then with all the com¬ 
passion of his soul into her face. She did not turn 
her eyes to meet his, but kept on at his side, her 
great spurs clashing over the uneven planks, her 
head bent as if sorrow had descended upon her and 
wrapped her in its cloud. 

They turned from the unfenced highway well be¬ 
yond the last house of Cottonwood, and sat on a 
little knoll, where the wind from Texas came blow¬ 
ing free, full of the indefinable spices of autumn, 
soft and beguiling, and home-calling as a maiden’s 
song. 


302 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


“I wish I had my hair,” said she, after a long 
silence. 

“It was too bad to cut it off thataway, Fannie. 
Couldn't it 'a' been combed out?” 

“Maybe.” 

“It was the finest hair I ever saw on a lady's 
head, bar none. Well, it’ll grow out again, 
Fannie.” 

“Yes,” she said, “it'll grow out, but you'll be 
gone then, Texas.” 

“Yes, I’ll be gone.” 

“If I'd known for sure you were here I wouldn't 
have had it cut. But I didn't know whether you 
were alive or dead, and I was afraid to come back 
a girl. Between them, Stott and Mackey would 
have killed me, Texas.” 

“I wouldn't put it past them.” 

“Yes, and I’ll tell you, Texas, Stott won’t own 
up to the cattlemen to clear you. He'll wiggle out 
of it some way.” 

“I'll call him up to the lick-log in the morning.” 

“He’ll not be afraid of us now, since he’s paid 
that money back to the McCoys; he’ll tell us to go 
to hell.” 

“Maybe he will, Fannie.” 

“Nobody will believe a man as generous as him 
would shoot his pardner in the back. I guess we 




THE DARK HORIZON 303 

cut the string and let him go when we put that up 
to him, Texas.” 

“Well, it’s done; he owed the money, and it’s 
paid—I reckon it’s paid.” 

Fannie rolled over on the grass, stretched herself 
on her stomach, propping herself on her elbows. 
She chewed a joint of bluestem, and took her hat 
off to let the wind have its way, saying nothing for 
a long time. Then: 

“Texas?” 

“Yes, Fannie.” 

“Don’t you think you ought to take the train out 
of here to-day?” 

“I’m not runnin’ away from any man, or set of 
men, Fannie. I’m not ready to leave just now.” 

“Stott won’t tell the cattlemen you’re square, 
Texas, and they’ll get you. They’ll be in here fifty 
to one, and you’ll never have a show for your 
money at all.” 

“If Stott don’t clear me, I’ll have to do it myself, 
Fannie. I’ve got an appointment with a man that’s 
undertaken to settle it in his own way for the rest 
of them. That’s one reason why I can’t leave till 
he comes.” 

Fannie got up, looking at him with a question in 
her frightened eyes. 

“What man, Texas?” 


304 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


“His name is Winch. I don’t reckon you know 
him.” 

The name seemed to daze her. She sat staring 
at him, her lips open, her eyes distended, her breath 
held as if she listened. 

“I’ve been hearing about him for years. He’ll 
never give you a square deal, Texas—he never gave 
any man a square deal. Dee Winch is as crooked 
as a snake!” 


CHAPTER XXII 


A RENDEZVOUS WITH DEATH 

I T was late that evening when the news began 
to fly around Cottonwood that Johnnie Mac- 
key had transferred his interests to Jud 
Springer and quit the town in the dark. It was 
the biggest sensation that Cottonwood ever had ex¬ 
perienced. Even the thrashing of the mayor be¬ 
came a secondary incident in the town’s history, 
and in the minds of the knowing ones merely a 
forerunning branch of this great event. For, 
closely as their meeting with Mackey had been 
guarded, there were some who were aware of it, and 
Texas and the dark little stranger were at once 
clothed with a mysterious importance that lifted 
them to a conspicuous situation in the public eye. 

Detectives, it was generally said they were, who 
had a line on Mackey’s past, brought in by Jud 
Springer for the purpose of smoking him out. 
Springer got the credit for it; nobody ever had 
heard of a shrewder business move. 

The town remained awake longer than usual to 
talk about it, the citizens and visitors shifting from 
one of Jud Springer’s gaping doors to the other, 
305 


306 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


almost everybody rejoicing in the overthrow of 
Mackey, who had made his office a position of op¬ 
pression. On account of public felicitation, and 
the unusual celebration among the normally staid 
and domesticated citizens, the town was drowsy 
next morning and asleep later than its accustomed 
hour. 

Cattlemen began to arrive before the sun had 
struck down to the door lintels of the stores, and be¬ 
fore anything but the restaurants and all-night 
saloons was open. Several came to the Woodbine 
Hotel for breakfast, and Mrs. Goodloe was showing 
more teeth than a shark. 

Hartwell was up early, waiting the opening of 
the bank, to exact justice, and the fulfillment of his 
agreement, from Stott. Back and forth, like a 
sentry, he walked a short beat opposite the bank, 
waiting the opening-hour. People who recognized 
him in passing spoke with respect, and turned in 
curiosity to look at him again, wondering what new 
eruption was to come in the business of Cottonwood 
out of that early patrolling in the street. 

Hartwell was concerned over the arrival of the 
cattlemen, whose horses were already thick along 
the hitching-racks up and down the street. These 
had come from near-by ranches, as the freshness of 
their animals told, and there was none among them 


A RENDEZVOUS WITH DEATH 307 

who seemed to recognize him, no one whom Hart¬ 
well identified as a member of the recent expedition 
against the Texans. 

There was one advantage of having a crowd of 
them in town looking for him, at any rate—Stott’s 
audience would be the larger for his confession, if 
he had not already made it to Duncan. His dis¬ 
trust of Stott, stirred by Fannie’s declaration that 
he never would implicate himself by his own con¬ 
fession to clear another, had grown through the 
night. Hartwell was uneasy over the outlook now, 
for if Winch should come in before the bank opened 
it would mean a fight, and the useless sacrifice of 
one or the other of their lives. 

It wanted a few minutes of nine o’clock when 
Major Simmonds, the teller, arrived, his hat at a 
gallant slant. He unlocked the door with high im¬ 
portance, swung it back, and put the brick against 
it, and disappeared behind the grill. Hartwell 
roamed anxious eyes up and down the street, watch¬ 
ing for Stott, determined to go across and stop him 
before he could get into the bank. 

He was thus engaged in his survey of the street 
when Major Simmonds came rushing out, bare¬ 
headed, hair disarranged from the bald spot which 
he took such studious care to conceal. Hartwell 
was the nearest person to him, directly across the 


308 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


street. Major Simmonds came running toward 
him, making a signal with his flapping arms like 
a switchman stopping a train. 

“The bank’s robbed!” he yelled, stopping in the 
middle of the street. Hartwell hurried to him. 

“What’s that?” 

“Robbed—cleaned out—vault open, everything 
gone!” 

“Run for Stott—I’ll call the marshal!” 

Texas hurried off toward the little calaboose, be¬ 
hind which the town marshal lived, and the teller 
started off to summon Stott, leaving the bank door 
wide open. People who had heard the shouted 
alarm came running, and when Texas returned with 
the marshal in a few minutes the street before the 
gaping bank door was filled by the crowd of deeply 
concerned patrons. 

The marshal posted himself in the door, refusing 
to allow even the anxious directors of the concern 
to enter until the arrival of Stott. The teller came 
panting back presently, his face white, his eyes 
fairly hanging on his cheeks. 

“Gone!” said he. 

A big gray man in a grocer’s apron laid hold of 
the teller’s shoulder and shook him, as if to settle 
him down to coherency. 

“Gone? Who’s gone?” he shouted. 

“Stott!” the teller groaned. 


A RENDEZVOUS WITH DEATH 309 

“Where’s his wife?” another anxious-faced busi¬ 
ness man inquired, pushing forward. 

“She left for Kansas City yesterday afternoon.” 

“Oh, well, Stott’s around town somewhere, then,” 
said the grocer. “Come on, we’ve got to find him.” 

A general alarm for Stott went through the town, 
on the heels of the news that the bank had been 
robbed, and everything down to the last security 
carried off. The marshal held his place in the 
door, and would not allow anybody to enter until 
it became a determined fact that Stott was gone. 

Then the directors took possession of the con¬ 
cern, to find that the president’s hand, and no other, 
had cleaned it to the crumbs. There was no doubt 
about that; he had left his mark behind him in a 
hundred ways. He had left nothing but a heap 
of silver representing a few hundred dollars, too 
heavy and unprofitable to carry away. 

Hartwell turned away from the sullen crowd that 
waited the final announcement of the bank’s direc¬ 
tors, feeling the defalcation and flight of the banker 
as keenly as any man whose all was on deposit 
there. Stott had robbed them only of their money, 
and a man could replace that if he lived long 
enough, and denied himself, and good fortune kept 
its hand over him; but a man who had been robbed 
of his main chance of saving his honor had been 
left bankrupt beyond repair. 


310 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


The only temporary advantage of the situation 
was that it drew the thoughts of the cattlemen from 
himself to Stott, for most of them were depositors 
of the bank. There was hurried mounting among 
them, fevered riding away to spread the alarm, for 
Stott had not left by railroad. He had either gone 
toward the Nation, heading for No Man’s Land, 
or in the direction of Wichita, where he would take 
a train on his flight to the security of Canada. On 
the chance that he might cross some line of informa¬ 
tion before he got away, the directors telegraphed 
his description abroad. 

Hartwell had not seen Fannie that morning. He 
turned to the hotel now to look for her. 

“He was up before you, Texas, and et only a 
snack of breakfast,” Mrs. Goodloe told him. “I 
saw him ride past a little while afterward, headin’ 
south.” 

“Some business of his own, I guess,” said Texas. 

“He paid his bill like he wasn’t cornin’ back.” 

“The little rascal—to go off thataway and never 
leave me a word! Oh, well, I reckon he’ll be 
around di-rec’ly.” 

“I’ll bet he’s gone to see his girl. He had a 
pinin’ look in his eye like a boy that was in love. 
He’s a nice quiet little feller, as soft-spoken as a 
woman.” 


A RENDEZVOUS WITH DEATH 311 


“Pure gold, ma’am, right down to the tacks of 
his boots.” 

Texas was troubled over Fannie’s peculiar be¬ 
havior as he walked toward Uncle Boley’s shop. 
Perhaps she believed that things were finished for 
her in Cottonwood and had gone back to her 
cousin’s ranch. It might be that what he had said 
about their ways beginning already to part had 
something to do with it. Maybe she had gone 
away thinking that he was selfish and ungrateful. 
Remorse at this thought came over him, to make 
that dark hour more bitter. 

It wasn’t like Fannie to leave him as long as 
there might be need of her testimony to clear him 
in the cattlemen’s eyes, and she did not know at the 
hour she left that Stott had cleaned out the bank 
and gone. Something had urged her upon her 
lonely road, but Texas was not vain enough, 
sophisticated enough, even to consider that it might 
be her love for him, hopeless as she knew it to be. 

Uncle Boley was in his door, looking down the 
street toward the bank. He had his apron on, and 
his beard tucked out of the way, signs which told 
Texas that he had left the bench but lately, and did 
not intend to allow the rascality of Henry Stott to 
rise up between him and his work very long. 

“Well, he’s run off, has he?” Uncle Boley in- 


312 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


quired, his bright eyes livelier for the excitement, 
his voice eager. 

“Yes, and everything gone with him that he 
could lay his ornery hands on, Uncle Boley.” 

“Serves ’em right for trustin’ to that man. He 
never done an honest deed in his life ’cept when he 
was druv to it, and then it went so hard agin the 
grain you could hear him crack. I tell you, Texas, 
when this town finds out what you and that girl 
made him do for that widder woman yesterday it’ll 
rair up and whoop.” 

“You didn’t tell her—Mrs. McCoy—that we had 
any hand in it, did you, Uncle Boley?” 

Texas asked him the question with such haste 
and eagerness that it was almost a plea. 

“You know I never,” said Uncle Boley, re¬ 
proachfully. “When I pass my word to a man it 
sticks.” 

“I know it, Uncle Boley, and I beg your pardon, 
sir. I was nearly in a fit when I thought maybe 
they’d found out.” 

“It’d do you a hell of a lot of harm if they had! ” 
Uncle Boley was sharply sarcastic. He spat on the 
sidewalk, and worked his mouth in that chopping 
manner so alarming to behold by one who did not 
know his ways. 

“Well, this town it’ll never think any better of 
me for it, Uncle Boley. That scoun’rel sneaked 


A RENDEZVOUS WITH DEATH 313 

off and left me holdin’ the sack, never said one word 
to them cattlemen that’ll clear me.” 

“No, I don’t reckon he did,” said Uncle Boley, 
thoughtfully. “It wasn’t to be expected of him. 
I see them cow-men ridin’ in here early, and they’re 
all stirred up, they tell me, ’count of fever breakin* 
out on the range.” 

“They’re cornin’ in for a settlement with me, I’ve 
been told, Uncle Boley. This is the day of the big 
doin’s, I guess.” 

“Yes, I was told; the news has went around. 
Well, where’s that Fannie girl?” 

Texas told him that she had gone, with no word 
behind her. 

“What do you reckon got into her to fly up and 
leave that way?” 

“I don’t know, Uncle Boley, unless she felt hurt, 
sir, because she thought I was ungrateful for all 
she’d helped me to do, for all I never could ’a’ done, 
sir, without her help.” 

Uncle Boley shook his head, bent over his work, 
shook his head again from time to time, through 
a long interval of silence. 

“It wasn’t that, Texas. She left because she was 
jealous. One agin the other, and you lost both of 
’em. Well, you wasn’t to blame; it just come out: 
that way.” 

“I bungled it up so, sir!” said Texas, regret- 


314 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


fully. “I always was as clumsy as a colt for gettin’ 
my legs tangled up in the rope.” 

“Well, if Sallie don’t come on her knees to you 
when she finds out what you’ve done for her and 
her mother, I’ll take in my horns.” 

Texas put his hand on the old man’s shoulder 
and looked him earnestly in the face. 

“Uncle Boley, the best kindness you can do me 
is never to mention my name in that matter to them. 
Give Fannie the full credit for it; it rightly be¬ 
longs to her. As she said, she gave me the cards 
—all I did was play them. Keep my name out of 
it the same as if I was a man that’d been hung.” 

“I don’t see what you’re goin’ to gain by that,” 
said Uncle Boley impatiently. 

“There’s nothing to be gained, one way or the 
other. I’ll have to walk out there in the road di- 
rec’ly, sir, and face them cattlemen, for no man 
nor set of men’s ever goin’ to say they come a lookin’ 
for me and I couldn’t be found. I’ll go out there 
and I’ll face ’em, Uncle Boley, and I’ll do my best 
for the sake of the land I come from, and the right 
that I know is on my side.” 

“It ain’t right for you to have to go that way, 
Texas,” the old man protested, “and you a burnin’ 
your heart up for Sallie.” 

Texas did not deny it. He sat with drooping 
head, leaning forward a bit, dejection over him, 


A RENDEZVOUS WITH DEATH 315 

his world so dark that he could not see more than 
the length of his arm ahead. And what he looked 
on then was only a world of strife. 

A picture of a man staggering backward, his 
hands outfiung, his gun falling by his side, per¬ 
sisted in his mental vision against the background 
of men and horses and dust in the trampled street. 
This was a picture that did not change, that he 
could not divert his faculties from for one hour of 
complete peace. The central figure in it was al¬ 
ways the same, and that falling man was Texas 
Hartwell, a death-wound in his breast. 

“If you come through it, Texas, then what’re 
you aimin’ to do?” 

Uncle Boley had put down his work, for the 
gloom of that threatening hour was heavy over his 
heart. He pulled his beard from under his sus¬ 
pender and spread it on his breast, sure indication 
that his work for that morning was at an end. 
Texas sat up stiffly, his eyes fixed as in a dream on 
the little window looking dustily into the street. 

“Sir, I’m goin’ to straddle a horse and take out 
after that pore little bird that’s gone off draggin’ 
her broken wings, and I’m a goin’ to foller her till 
I find her, and if I can make her glad I’ll do it, 
no matter what it costs.” 

Uncle Boley was moved by this declaration, al¬ 
most to the point of panic. If Texas had been his 


316 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


son he could not have felt a sharper pang at his 
declared intention of allowing gratitude to push 
his life’s promise all behind him, and go riding 
away on a quest like that. 

“If Fannie was a good woman, Texas!” said he, 
a pathetic tenderness in his trembling voice. 

“A woman don’t have to be very good to be bet¬ 
ter than a man, Uncle Boley.” 

“And even if she was a good woman you couldn’t 
give her your heart. It’d be a sin to throw yourself 
away on Fannie.” 

“I could give her a man’s name and protection, 
and I could lift her pore face up to the sky.” 

“God help you, son, if you’re set on doin’ that!” 

“Never mind,” said Texas, soothingly, “never 
mind it at all. When I’m gone from here, no mat¬ 
ter which way I leave, cross me out and turn over 
the leaf.” 

Uncle Boley turned to the row of boots on the 
little shelf, took them down, boot by boot, and 
wiped the dust from them on his sleeve. He kept 
his back turned toward Texas, for tears were roll¬ 
ing down his beard. 

“Well, I declare, Uncle Boley, sir, if I didn’t 
clean forget that old ant-eater we shut up here 
night before last!” said Texas, starting up. 

“He’s gone—slep’ off his drunk about sundown 
yesterday and come walkin’ out. Stopped to cuss 


A RENDEZVOUS WITH DEATH 317 

me, place of thankin’ me for his lodgin’. I’ve seen 
some ornery men in my time, but I never seen one 
that had all the ornery p’ints Zeb Smith’s got.” 

“He’ll not be needed, anyhow, it’s just as well 
he’s gone. He’s lost his boardin’-house pass, now 
Stott’s left; he’ll have to rack out and hunt him up 
once more.” 

“I hear Ollie Noggle’s packin’ a gun for him.” 

“I expect Zeb’ll live to be a mighty old man if 
he waits till Noggle bores a hole in him, Uncle 
Boley.” 

“I reckon he will.” 

Texas stood in the door. Down the street where 
there had been so much excitement and activity an 
hour before, all was quiet. Few horses remained 
hitched at the racks before saloons and stores, the 
midday somnolence of ordinary times having set¬ 
tled over Cottonwood again. Many of the cattle¬ 
men had gone riding for the trail of Henry Stott, 
the business that had brought them to town so early 
having been driven from their thoughts by this new 
calamity. 

For a while Texas was more than half in the 
mind to buy a horse and strike out at once after 
Fannie, and leave that tangle of trouble behind. 
But he could not outrun it very long. A blot would 
remain on his name to spread and enlarge after 
him, and reach again to him in time, no matter 


318 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


where he might go in the world of cattle. And 
there was no other world for him, no other pursuit 
of which he was master enough to make a bluff of 
living by. 

On the other hand, staying on there for the vio¬ 
lent adjustment that the cattlemen were bent on 
making might never lead to anything more than his 
death. The waters of his disgrace would close 
above his grave, never to be parted again. So he 
stood weighing it, and a man came riding around 
the corner below him, and turned his horse toward 
the Woodbine Hotel. 

There was no mistaking the rider, for, once seen 
in the saddle, Dee Winch was not to be forgotten. 
His traits on horse-back were as marked as his 
peculiarities on foot. 

Dee Winch it was. He had come to keep his 
appointment and carry out his word. Winch 
would go straight to the hotel looking for him, for 
he had sent word to the little man-slayer that he 
would find him there when wanted. 

Winch should not be disappointed. Hartwell 
would keep the engagement as honestly as a lover. 
All thought of riding away from Cottonwood dis¬ 
solved from his mind, all the business of life that 
involved him sprung to a sudden point. He was 
conscious suddenly of an unaccountable lightness, 
of a relief from a long and heavy strain. Dee 


A RENDEZVOUS WITH DEATH 319 


Winch should not look for him in vain, a sneer on 
his thin lip, his protruding teeth laid bare. Life’s 
business had come to a sudden head. His adven¬ 
ture lay before him; he was no longer a listening 
man. 

“They’re thinning out down there, most of 
them’s gone,” said Texas, turning to the old man, 
speaking with his accustomed slowness and se¬ 
renity. “I’m goin’ to step down to the ho -tel a, 
minute, sir, and see if Fannie didn’t leave a letter 
for me that they over-looked.” 

Uncle Boley went to the door and looked out* 
and seemed relieved by the appearance of placidity 
that had fallen again over the town. 

“Well, you’ll be back in a little while I reckon, 
Texas?” 

“I’ll be back almost di-rec’ly, Uncle Boley,” 
Texas replied, standing a moment with his foot on 
the step to smile before he turned away to keep his 
rendezvous with Winch. 


CHAPTER XXIII 


SACRIFICE SUPREME 

W INCH had disappeared when Texas 
started to the hotel. Texas believed 
he had gone to the livery stable to leave 
his horse, doubtless having returned to Cotton¬ 
wood with the intention of making a considerable 
stay. 

Mrs. Goodloe was in the hotel office, gasping and 
shaking her head, and laboring to express to her¬ 
self her astonishment and grief over the shocking 
downfall of Cottonwood’s financial pillar. She 
was wearing a new plaid waist that morning, with 
most surprising effect on her facial peculiarities, 
and this, together with the excitement under which 
she labored, had turned her into the homeliest hu¬ 
man that Hartwell had ever seen. 

“Ain’t it awful about Henry Stott?” she said, as 
Texas appeared in the door. 

“Not so bad for him, I guess, ma’am, as the folks 
he’s robbed.” 

“No, hangin’s too good for that man if they ketch 
liim. Malvina, she’s in her room cryin’ her eyes 
out over the seven hundred dollars she had in the 
320 


321 


SACRIFICE SUPREME 

bank, and her slavin’ nearly five years to git ahead 
that much over payin’ for the house.” 

“Aou don’t tell me, ma’am! I didn’t know she 
was a depositor, but I reckon most everybody was.” 

“Ollie had ninety dollars, there, too. He’s sorry 
now he didn’t cut Stott’s throat the last time he had 
him in his chair, and he’d ’a’ done it, too, if he’d 
’a’ knowed what was in his rascally mind! ” 

“Has he gone out with the posse to hunt for track 
of Stott?” 

“No, he’s over at the shop. Zeb Smith’s roamin’ 
around agin, out of a job since Mackey sold and 
skipped.” 

“He’s a mighty ornery man, ma’am.” 

“Yes, and Ollie says he ain’t worth killin’, but 
he knows he’ll have to do it before he’ll have any 
peace.” 

“Has anybody been in lookin’ for me, ma’am?” 

“No, Texas; nobody ain’t.” 

“I’m goin’ up to my room to write a letter, and 
I wish you’d call me if anybody comes askin’.” 

“Sure I will, Texas.” 

Hartwell had little business to leave behind him 
if he should be summoned suddenly from the world, 
but what there was he wanted to set straight. 
There was a shadowy possibility that something 
might come in time out of the present worthless in¬ 
vestments in Kansas City. The deeds to these mel- 


322 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


ancholy stretches of vacant fields he had carried in 
his blanket roll when he came to Cottonwood. 
Now he wrapped them and addressed them to his 
sister, with a letter for Malvina, directing her to 
post the packet in the event of his death. 

That done, he polished his boots, put on his 
black coat, and prepared himself to quit this life 
with dignity and decency, according to the way that 
he had lived it. He was brushing his hat by the 
window when he saw Fannie ride by, just catching 
an identifying glimpse of her in the angling view 
that his window gave of the street. 

He thrust the papers, which he wanted them to 
find on his dead body if he should fall, into the 
breast pocket of his coat and hurried down-stairs. 
When he reached the street, Fannie was half way 
to Uncle Boley’s and, coming from the opposite 
direction a little way beyond her, Dee Winch, turn¬ 
ing his head from side to side as he rode, as if 
searching for somebody among the people on the 
walks. 

It was all to make a show and a parade of it 
beforehand, this riding around on the pretense that 
he had to seek him out, thought Texas, as suddenly 
resentful over the little gun-slinger’s behavior as 
if he had slapped him in the face. Winch must 
have known where to look for him all the time. 
Even if his messenger had failed to return Hart- 


SACRIFICE SUPREME 


323 


well’s answer to him, he had only to inquire in 
passing .where to find the man whom he sought. 

Hartwell hurried along the comparatively empty 
sidewalk, keeping to the outer edge to make him¬ 
self conspicuous in Winch’s eyes. Fannie was 
about a hundred yards ahead of him, riding in a 
slow walk. 

Texas noted that a considerable number of cat¬ 
tlemen had returned to town. Among them he rec¬ 
ognized several who had been in the party that rode 
to turn the Texas invaders, and these looked hard 
at him, and stood together talking and watching 
him after he had passed. Their action and num¬ 
bers concerned him little now. Winch was before 
him; the long waiting and listening were at an end. 
Up the street he saw Uncle Boley in front of his 
shop, his black alpaca coat on, his beard about him 
like a fog. 

About midway between the old man and Hart¬ 
well, Fannie and Winch met. A moment before 
she passed him, Fannie jerked her horse sharply 
and rode in front of Winch, changing her course 
so abruptly that the animals almost collided. This 
threw her on the left-hand side of Winch, and, as 
she came face to face with him, she raised her quirt 
with her left hand and struck him a sharp blow 
across the face. 


CHAPTER XXIV 


TRAGEDY 

E VEN at the distance which divided them, 
Hartwell heard the blow fall. He bounded 
forward as her purpose in this affront came 
to him in a flash. 

“Winch, Winch! That’s a woman!” he shouted 
as he ran. 

Winch did not heed. That he heard there could 
be no doubt, for several cattlemen ahead of Hart¬ 
well repeated the warning to the infuriated gun¬ 
slinger. 

Almost instantly, almost simultaneously, two 
shots sounded out of the confusion of trampling 
horses and rising dust. And there was Winch 
standing beside his fallen horse, his smoking re¬ 
volver in his hand; beyond him a rod, lying in the 
dust of the road, Fannie Goodnight, her arms 
stretched wide, her face upon the ground. Her 
frightened horse was galloping away with flying 
stirrups; Winch was standing with his arm crooked, 
his gun half raised, as if he waited for her to move. 

A moment, like figures revealed by a lightning 
stroke, those who stood in the street saw this picture. 
324 


TRAGEDY 325 

Then Hartwell leaped into it, a cry in his throat 
like the voice of despairing pain. 

Winch did not change the position of his body, 
which was three-quarters full toward Hartwell. 
With a little slinging jerk of his gun he fired, then 
staggered back, his arms outflung, his weapon 
dropped from his hand. Three bullets from Hart¬ 
well’s pistol struck him in the breast before he 
touched the ground. 

Fannie was breathing when Hartwell lifted her 
and ran with her to Uncle Boley’s shop, the people 
pressing behind him with the senseless curiosity of 
cattle. Uncle Boley shut the door on them. 
Texas carried her into the old man’s room and laid 
her on his bed. 

Uncle Boley went out the back door, after one 
quick look at Fannie’s face, to bring the doctor. 
Texas bent over her, his heart melting with unut¬ 
terable emotions, and bathed her face, and spoke 
to her in endearing whispers broken by his grief. 
He opened her shirt and disclosed her wound, down 
in her white bosom toward her heart, below the dark 
stain that disguised the fairness of her face and 
neck. 

Fannie opened her eyes, quite unexpectedly, and 
smiled. There was blood on her lips; he wiped .it 
away. 

“Did I get him, Texas?” she asked. 


326 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


“Yes honey, you got him.” 

She closed her eyes, and a weary placidity set¬ 
tled over her face. 

“I went out to get him, Texas, before he—could 
get—you.” 

The last of it trailed away as if it blended with 
death. He took her hand and pressed it to his 
bosom, murmuring endearments to her in the panic 
of his grief. She reached up and touched his face; 
clasped her cold hands about his neck. He bent 
with her gentle pressure and kissed her lips. 

So she smiled, and died, peace in her face, as if 
absolution had come to her soul in that caress. 
Hartwell bowed his head on her poor breast in 
agony that rent his heart. 

Hartwell joined Uncle Boley in the shop after 
a while, unashamed of the traces of grief in his 
face. 

“She was pure gold, Uncle Boley, as true a friend 
as a man ever had in this world,” said he. 

Uncle Boley was sitting in front of the door, as 
if on guard, trouble in his face, his shoemaker’s 
hammer on the floor beside him. 

“Did she speak to you before she went, Texas?” 

Texas told him what she had said. Uncle Boley 
looked up, his face bright with admiration, his eyes 
tender for the great sacrifice that she had made. 


TRAGEDY 


327 


“She went out to hunt him, and left early for 
fear you’d stop her.” 

“Yes, sir, that’s what she did.” 

“She picked a fuss with him, thinkin’ she could 
kill him and stop him from hurtin’ you.” 

“She did just that, Uncle Boley, God bless her 
little heart!” 

Uncle Boley got up and moved about the shop 
under the stress of his great emotion. Now and 
then he shook his head, and he was busy with his 
handkerchief about his eyes. 

“You can’t beat ’em, can’t beat ’em!” said he. 
“When they’re true, they’re above anything that a 
man can conceive of, and when they ain’t, they’re 
hell-fire and mustard! Hell-fire and mustard, 
Texas, when they ain’t.” 

“Yes, sir, I guess that’s so.” 

“And I said she wasn’t a good woman! Lord 
forgive me—that’s what I said about that little Fan¬ 
nie!” He started toward the bedroom door, 
stopped, turned back. “Did you cover her face 
up, son?” 

“Yes, sir, I covered her pore little face up from 
the light of this unkind world.” 

“I’m not fit to,” said Uncle Boley, bowing his old 
white head, “not fit to touch her foot!” 

“I suppose there’ll be an inquiry into this by 
the coroner, and I’ll be held to answer for my part 


328 THE TRAIL RIDER 

in it, sir, accordin’ to law, till it’s cleared up and 
dismissed.” 

“I reckon so. And that ain’t half of it. Them 
cowmen they’re growlin’ around and talkin’ about 
cornin’ up here and handlin’ you, Texas. The doc¬ 
tor overheard a good deal of their talk, and I don’t 
like the looks of things. That’s why I was settin’ 
there in the door with that hammer. I was goin’ 
to brain the first man that tried to put a hand on 
you! ” 

Texas went to the door. It was past the noon 
hour and the visiting cattlemen had cleared out of 
the streets, seeking the restaurants for dinner, leav¬ 
ing their horses to gnaw hitching poles, according 
to their established way. 

“I’ll go down and get the undertaker to care for 
Fannie’s body,” he said, “and after that I’ll hunt 
up the marshal and see if he wants to lock me up 
till the coroner’s jury sets. I’m tired, Uncle Boley, 
clean through to the bone.” 

“I reckon it’s the best thing to do,” Uncle Boley 
agreed. “I’ll watch over her, Texas, as tender as 
if she was flesh of my flesh and bone of my bone. 
To-morrow we’ll lay her away. I’ll go up and 
see the preacher about her funeral as soon as the 
undertaker comes.” 

“No preacher ever had a chance to do a nobler 
office in this world.” 


TRAGEDY 


329 


Texas went on to the hotel after his visit to the 
undertaker, not having been able to find the town 
marshal. A number of cattlemen were at dinner 
there, singularly silent for men of such boisterous 
manner. Like some other people in the world that 
day, Texas reflected, they had enough to think 
about to make them serious. 

He did not give more than a passing thought to 
the threats which Uncle Boley had heard they were 
making against him, for he knew that it was in¬ 
evitable that such murmuring should attend the kill¬ 
ing of a man. It was no more to him than the 
blowing of the wind, sore as he was in heart that 
hour. 

He went to his room, where he sat in the gloom 
of dejection, the past a seeming waste behind him, 
the future a blank curtain which he had no desire 
left in him to move aside and pass. There was 
no regret for the slaying of Dee Winch. That 
seemed to him such a small incident in the turmoil 
of the past few hours that it might have been the 
deed of any other man than himself. It had no 
personal connection; it seemed but an isolated and 
inconsequential happening in which he was only 
technically concerned. 

The big thing that filled the day was the sac¬ 
rifice that Fannie had made of her life. Nobly 
conceived, generously carried out, but so pathetic- 


330 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


ally useless, so sorrowfully mistaken. Still, Dee 
Winch might have killed him if they had met face 
to face without the vengeance for that hideous deed 
to quicken Hartwell’s hand. This he considered, 
also, his heart dead within him, his head bowed 
down in grief. 

So that matter was finished, and his business 
was done in Cottonwood, sad business for the 
greater part, for which time had been saving him, 
it seemed. He must leave now with the taint of 
treason on him, for there was no word to be lifted 
in his behalf but his own. Whatever burst of sun 
had come into his days there had ended quickly 
in storm. There were goldenrod and brown eyes, 
and a little thread of new hope that his heart had 
begun to weave. These were to be remembered— 
sentimental trifles to be shut up in the book which 
he was about to close, and put away forever. 

He sat wrapped in his thoughts a long time, too 
heavy with sorrow, too dumb from the shock of 
the tragedy, to care to move a foot. Below he heard 
the sound of feet coming and going, and the sound 
of strong voices as the men stood in front of the 
hotel and discussed the events which they had 
ridden to share in Cottonwood that day. 

Malvina was at his door—he knew her step as 
she came up the stairs, quick and light as a girl’s. 


TRAGEDY 


331 


He opened to her, to see her eyes big with fear, her 
cheeks pale. 

“Malcolm Duncan and them men—they want 
you, Texas! ” she whispered. 

“All right, Mrs. Noggle. Please say to them 
I’ll be right straight down.” 

“Oh, my God! They’ll kill you, Texas,” she 
moaned. “They’ve been talkin’ about it—it’s no 
secret in town—they’ll kill you, I know they will! ” 

Texas was buckling on his gun. Her message 
had stirred a new desire in him, a fierce and savage 
desire to swim back to the shore of peace and safety 
through a wild turmoil of strife. If they wanted 
a fight they could have it, and a fight that some of 
them would remember above all the combats of 
their lives. Right here and now accounts between 
him and the drovers of the Arkansas Valley range 
would be adjusted for good and all. 

“Maybe they will kill me,” he said, calmly, 
reaching for his long black coat which he had flung 
down on the bed. 

“Go down the back stairs,” she whispered, lean¬ 
ing into the room, “walk easy—I’ll make a noise 
when I go down!” 

Texas turned to her with a smile, offering her 
his hand. 

“Thank you, ma’am, for your good intention, but 


332 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


I’m not a backdoor man. I’m under favors to you 
for the many kindnesses you’ve done for me in this 
house. If they happen to get me, ma’am, there’s 
money of mine left with Uncle Boley to pay you 
what I owe. Good-by, ma’am, and kindest wishes 
forever.” 

His heart was soft for the simple woman who had 
defied public sentiment to befriend him. Her faith 
had been like a flower in the desert. She was cry¬ 
ing against the wall beside his door when he left 
her, and the sound of her sobbing reached him as 
he went down the stairs, like the grief of a mother 
who sees her son borne away to the grave. 

Malcolm Duncan was standing just within the 
office door. Beyond him Hartwell saw many others 
blocking his way to the street. But he did not 
turn his eyes about, no,r consider any other pas¬ 
sage from the house. They had sent for him, and 
he had come, and his way lay straight ahead of 
him, as lays a man’s way always when his con¬ 
science is clear. 

Duncan stepped forward to meet Hartwell, hold¬ 
ing out his hand. 

“Texas, I want to apologize to you publicly, on 
my own account and on behalf of the Cattle Rais¬ 
ers’ Association,” he said. 

Hartwell was so wrenched by this unexpected 


TRAGEDY 


333 


turn that he stopped, drew back a step, as if he 
struggled to adjust his equilibrium to the sudden 
reeling of the earth beneath his feet. 

It was a thing to take a man’s breath, and spring 
a question in his mind, to be met by a friendly hand 
where he expected to face hostile guns. Hartwell 
couldn’t grasp it for a second or two. He left Dun¬ 
can standing with his hand outstretched. Then a 
great warm surge of thankfulness, of peace, of re¬ 
born desire, came flooding over him. He took 
Duncan’s hand. 

“Sir, I didn’t come down expectin’ this,” he said. 

“You came down expectin’ a fight, Hartwell, and 
I’m mighty glad it turned out you didn’t have to 
do it. You’d ’a’ gone through us like a hot iron 
through a paper sack from the way you looked.” 

“I’m thankful that it turned out otherwise,” 
Texas told him, solemnly. 

“I’ve found out the truth about them southern 
cattle, and I’m here to own up that we slandered 
and wronged you about as bad as a man can be 
slandered and wronged in this part of the country, 
Hartwell.” 

“It’s generous and square of you to say that, sir, 
and it’s all past and forgotten, as far as I’m con¬ 
cerned. It hurt for a while though, gentlemen 
it hurt me to the heart!” 


334 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


Malvina was on the stairs behind him. When 
Texas said that she caught her breath with a sharp 
sob, and came down, half blinded by her tears, and 
touched him on the shoulder as she passed. Mrs. 
Goodloe was big in the dining-room door, and be¬ 
hind her was Viney Kelly, who had been called in 
to help serve the tables during the unusually heavy 
dinner trade. Other cattlemen came crowding into 
the office to shake hands with Texas, who met them 
in hearty sincerity. 

“Word from Stott reached me this morning,” 
Duncan explained. “It was delayed in. reaching 
me, for I was out at the camp with the boys. If 
I’d ’a’ got it two hours sooner, things wouldn’t have 
ended the way they have.” 

“Yes, sir, it would have saved the life of one of 
the best and truest women that ever walked the 
earth! ” 

Hartwell flashed his eyes around as he said it, and 
drew himself up like a soldier, proud to stand the 
champion of Fannie Goodnight before the world. 

“I did the best I could, Hartwell,” said Duncan, 
gently. 

“I know it, sir. It just had to happen so, ar¬ 
ranged from the start for her, I guess. Life was a 
sort of mockery all the way through for her. The 
best it had to give it always fetched around too 
late.” 


TRAGEDY 


335 


Nobody mentioned his fight with Winch, for all 
felt that there was a certain taint of guilt attaching 
to them on that score. Winch had come to town 
that morning representing the cattlemen; his ven¬ 
geance was their vengeance, his creed their creed. 
They were ashamed of it now, but all of them were 
men, after a certain rude standard, and none 
sought to excuse himself of responsibility. 

They talked freely of their past animosity to¬ 
ward Texas, and of the fever which the southern 
cattle had spread on the range. By shifting their 
herds they were holding it down; it was the hope 
that a frost or two would see the end of it without 
any great loss. 

The city marshal came in presently, adding his 
congratulations with friendly effusion. 

“I’ve fixed it up with the coroner, Texas, 1 ” he 
said, “and there won’t be any inquest. I told him 
there wasn’t no use puttin’ the county to that ex¬ 
pense for a carcass like Dee Winch—it’s cost the 
county enough already buryin’ men he’s killed. 
A hundred people saw him shoot first; it was as 
plain a case of self-defense as ever happened in 
this town.” 

For all of which Texas expressed his gratitude 
in his warm, extravagant Southern fashion. The 
marshal went on about his business with his chest 
out, proud of the opportunity that had brought him 


336 THE TRAIL RIDER 

into such prominent touch with Cottonwood’s most 
notable hero. 

Business men whom he never had met stopped 
in during the cattlemen’s levee to shake hands with 
Hartwell. But after the first flush of satisfaction 
in feeling himself cleared, Texas began to settle 
back into the shadows of his melancholy. For 
there was one who did not come to add her felicita¬ 
tions when all the rest of the community seemed 
glad of his restoration to his place among honor¬ 
able men. 

Ranchers continued to arrive, for the news of 
Stott’s pillage of the bank had spread. Men who 
went out in the morning to pick up his trail were 
returning, reporting no trace. It was the belief 
now that he had boarded a freight train that had 
stopped at Cottonwood for water in the early hours 
of the night, and had escaped their hands. 

Texas yielded to Mrs. Goodloe’s pressure at last 
and went in for his dinner, to be attended by Yiney 
Kelly in a white waist with a gold locket hung 
round her neck on a slender red ribbon. He was 
the only occupant of the dining-room, for the hour 
was long past that of the regular dinner. 

Viney had little to say as she carried in the food 
and shifted the dishes about with ready hand, but 
she attempted a bit of pleasantry when it came 
to the choice of a drink. 


TRAGEDY 


337 


“Tay or caffee?” she asked, affecting the dialect 
which was her lawful heritage, adding quickly: 
“Say caffee—we have no tay.” 

“Caffee it is then,” said he, struggling to be gen¬ 
ial through his fog of melancholy gray. 

Viney came with the coffee and went back for the 
pie. When she arrived with this she stood close by 
Hartwell’s elbow, wiping the rim of the plate 
around carefully with her apron. Then she put 
the pie down before him and fell back a step, but 
to reach again and slide it clear of the other plates, 
a full arm’s length from the diner. Another re¬ 
treat to gather the effect, and another shift of the 
plate, this time bringing it into the middle dis¬ 
tance, where she allowed it to stand. It was if she 
maneuvered for the artistic distance, in which the 
fat slice of apple pie would be most appealing to 
the appetite of a man after it had been dulled by 
the charge of cabbage and beef. 

“The board’s going to put Sallie McCoy back in 
the school,” she said. 

“So they told me a little while ago.” 

“Well, I don’t care,” sighed Yiney. Then, hast¬ 
ily: “You know they hired me to take the primary 
grades in her place.” 

“No, I hadn’t heard.” 

“I don’t care, though. I’ve got thirteen music 
pupils and I’d ’a’ had to given—gave—them up. 


338 THE TRAIL RIDER 

She’s a good teacher, but she’s awful stuck on 
herself.” 

“You don’t tell me!” 

“Yes, and since Stott turned over that money to 
’em yesterday she’ll be so stuck-up you can’t touch 
her with a ten-foot pole. You heard about what 
Stott did—done—didn’t you?” 

“I just got rumors of it, ma’am.” 

“Well, some people think they’re no better than 
he is, takin’ money from him that he stole from 
somebody else, no matter if it was cornin’ to them, 
as some say it was.” 

“Would you please hand me a glass of water, 
ma’am?” 

Texas made the request with such distant formal¬ 
ity, such absolute dismissal of the subject to which 
she was warming with true scandalous scent, that 
Viney turned to look back at him as she sped on his 
request. 

When she returned she stood off a little way, 
dropping her locket down the V-collar of her waist 
and pulling it up again, as if she sounded the shal¬ 
lows of her bony bosom to find her heart. 

“Was there anything else you wished?” she 
asked. 

“Nothing at all, thank you kindly, ma’am.” 

She turned at the door to look at him again. 


TRAGEDY 


339 

He was sitting with his head bent in contemplative 
pose, as if he prayed silently, and the pie stood un¬ 
touched in the foreground, where Viney had pushed 
it when she brought the water. Soon from the par¬ 
lor the tremulous tones of the organ rose. Miss 
Kelly’s voice took up a song. 


“I’ll be all smiles to-ni-i-i-ght, 

I’ll be all smiles to-night; 

Though my heart should break to-mor-r-ow, 

I’ll be all smiles to-night!” 

Texas left the pie standing as it stood, to serve 
for another in better trim. Several people had 
come into the office; Mrs. Goodloe and Malvina 
were there, all talking excitedly. Miss Kelly’s la¬ 
ment was louder than their words; he wondered 
what new calamity had fallen as he hurried out to 
join them. 

“Oh, ain’t it awful!” said Mrs. Goodloe. 

“They caught him at Wichita!” Malvina said. 
“Just to think—” 

“Stott, the banker, you know,” said a man, rec¬ 
ognized by Texas as the railroad station agent by 
the badge on his hat; “he had two grips full of 
money.” 

“The minute they laid hands on him—oh, mercy, 


340 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


mercy! ” Mrs. Goodloe covered her eyes with her 
hands as she exclaimed. 

“Blowed his brains out,” said the station agent, 
turning to Texas, “with his own gun the minute 
they tapped him on the shoulder and said: ‘Come 
along with us.’ ” 


CHAPTER XXV 


AN AMAZING EXODUS 

Z EB SMITH was in a bitter frame of mind 
that afternoon. Out of a job, out of 
money, wanting a drink, and no credit in 
the town. The more he thought of the snug nest 
that Ollie Noggle had nosed him out of, the blacker 
grew his hate against the long-legged artist of the 
perfumed hair. 

Old Zeb was sitting on a keg in the shade of Jud 
Springer’s combination joint, where he had so lately 
been a power under the mighty arm of Johnnie 
Mackey. The smell of sour beer was in the keg, 
and a score of its mates around him, whetting Zeb’s 
appetite to frenzy. He cursed his bad luck, he 
cursed Malvina, he cursed the barber and, above 
all, with a double curse, he blasted Texas Hartwell 
for his meddlesome interference on the bridal night. 

If it hadn’t been for that glum-faced stranger, 
with that thing in his eyes which Smith had come 
to respect in the very few men who were gifted with 
it—that thing which was like a cold hand on the 
back of a man’s neck and lead in his heart—if it 
hadn’t been for that solemn, slow-voiced stranger, 
341 


342 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


look what he’d have come into! A hotel, and a 
good bed to stretch in, and meals at all hours and 
money coming in at doors and windows on every 
wind. It was a shame the way things ran in this 
world. What fatal prearrangement had fixed their 
conjunction in Cottonwood at that hour? That 
was what puzzled Smith and, because it puzzled 
him, threw him into a deep and dark resentfulness. 

There he had come to Cottonwood to hold up 
Henry Stott at close range, and had found the tent 
boarding-house that Malvina had started with hard¬ 
ened into a regular hotel, like some kind of a bug 
that grows a shell in the summer sun. First, this 
Texas had beaten him out of the hotel, with the in¬ 
significant assistance of the despicable barber, and 
now he had beaten him out of Stott. 

Fool enough in his own time, Zeb reflected, he 
had owned to Hartwell and that little Indian, that 
he had seen Stott murder McCoy and had been a 
pensioner of silence ever since. But that little Ind¬ 
ian knew it all the time, and knew more, so much 
more that old Zeb grew cold in a sweat when he con¬ 
sidered how much. But the little Indian was dead; 
he couldn’t talk. If Hartwell was out of there also, 
Zeb believed he could run the barber out of town 
and take his place again with his feet under Mal¬ 
vina’s table. 

Zeb hadn’t followed events very closely in Cot- 


AN AMAZING EXODUS 


343 


tonwood that day. He had heard that Stott was 
gone, and the little Indian killed, and somebody 
else shot up by that Texas man, but all those events 
were small and uninteresting in comparison with 
the demand of his clamoring nerves for a drink. 

And nobody in town would trust him; not a 
soul. He had ruined his chances by his overbear¬ 
ing conduct while working as bouncer for Mackey. 
He hadn’t a friend in the world. Worse than that, 
he hadn’t a single article left that he could pledge 
for a drink, or raise the money on. His gun was 
gone, his hat was gone, his spurs were gone. A 
man had to keep the rest of his clothes to meet the 
requirements of a despised society. 

It was torture to smell liquor and not be able 
to get it, for there was nothing in the beer kegs but 
the scent. Zeb had tipped them all, licked their 
chines, rammed his hot tongue into their bung- 
holes in the burning hope of one dribbling drop. 

And there was that barber, that snipe-shanked 
suds mixer, enjoying the kingdom that rightly be¬ 
longed to him. Noggle never lacked a dime to 
buy a drink, never knew the torture of the longing 
for one sizzling slug of whisky to cool his burning 
guts. 

A thought grew out of this bitter denunciation. 
It swelled in the vaporous brain of alcoholic lees 
and raised old Zeb Smith to his feet. That barber 


344 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


had money; people gave the fly-headed scoundrel 
dimes for shaves, quarters to cut their hair. And 
what Noggle had, by all the justice that the dis¬ 
inherited claim, belonged to him. 

Zeb got up; he headed for the barber shop, a 
glaze in his eyes, a feeling of dust on his dry lips, 
his tongue a streak of fire. What belonged to Nog¬ 
gle now had belonged to him originally. No con¬ 
sideration had been rendered for the bed and board 
which the barber had usurped. This was the day 
to collect. 

Noggle was not in the shop. The door stood 
open, a newspaper on the chair backed against it, 
just as if the barber had put it down and fled at 
the sound of his enemy’s footfall. But Noggle was 
quite unconscious of both Smith’s presence and de¬ 
signs. He was across the street in the drug store, 
smelling over a new stock of perfumes. 

Smith went in and sat down, turning his red eyes 
around the shop, taking stock of what could be 
snatched and carried off in case the barber did not 
return speedily and make a settlement in cash. 
The druggist called Noggle’s attention to the wait¬ 
ing customer, and Noggle went out to face the crisis 
of his life. 

Noggle was whistling a little tune when he 
stepped into the street, and the wind was playing 
in his scented hair, and turning back the skirts 


AN AMAZING EXODUS 345 

of his seersucker coat, displaying his pearl-handled 
gun. He could see the reflection of his own ele¬ 
gance in his shoes. Zeb Smith rose up and filled 
the door, as forbidding as a lion. 

Noggle did not stand to question any phase of 
the situation at all. He turned and ran, with a 
cold, gurgling noise in his throat of absolute fright. 
Smith dashed after him, commanding him in his 
hoarse, whisky-burned voice to stop and begin a 
reckoning. 

There was but one thought in Noggle’s mind, 
and that was the sanctuary of the hotel. Toward 
that refuge he sped, cutting the ground in great 
scissors leaps, old Zeb Smith close after him, his 
wild hair flying, his wild eyes glaring, his great 
mustache blowing back to his ears. Away through 
the business block they went, people giving ground 
to them, Noggle holding the middle of the sidewalk, 
that water-gurgle of cold terror still in his throat; 
after him followed Smith, the one thought of his 
thoughts being that his last chance must not be al¬ 
lowed to slip his hand. 

They passed the city marshal in front of Jud 
Springer’s new joint, but they were going faster 
than any city marshal in this world ever could hope 
to move of his own effort, driven by his own physi¬ 
cal machinery. He saw the uselessness of pursuit, 
and let them run unchallenged. 


346 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


When they arrived at the hotel, Smith was reach¬ 
ing for Noggle’s coat-tail. Up-stairs the barber 
leaped, up-stairs after him Smith lumbered; along 
the hall toward Malvina’s bedroom Noggle ran, 
shaking the house from shingle to foundation stone, 
and close behind his heels panted Smith, his eyes 
as red as hate. 

Noggle jumped to the door like a swooping eagle, 
Smith a rod behind him. Within there was a 
glimpse of bare shoulders, a shower of unloosed red 
hair, and the sharp alarm of a woman’s scream. 
Then the door was flung shut in Noggle’s face and 
locked, and the terrible Smith was upon him, his 
obscene hand gathering a firm hold in the back 
of the seersucker coat. 

Noggle felt a chill of fear crinkle his hair, and 
leaned and strained and pawed the floor in his strug¬ 
gle to break that hold. It broke, for seersucker is 
not as strong as fear in the heart of a coward nat¬ 
urally born, and away went Noggle again, on 
through the hall, down the back stairs, around the 
hotel, into the main street. He shaped his half¬ 
blind course for the door of his shop again, think¬ 
ing frantically of a razor, beating the ground with 
his long flat feet until the cow ponies hitched along 
the way reared back on their halters, and plunged 
and snorted, raising a dust for a background to 


AN AMAZING EXODUS 347 

the most tremendous race that Cottonwood ever 
had seen. 

And all the time there hung by the barber’s side, 
under his elbow, near the grasp of his true right 
hand, his .32 caliber pistol in its patent-leather 
case. 

Three razors lay on the little shelf beneath the 
mirror in Ollie Noggle’s shop, their blades bent 
backward like the heads of serpents lifted to strike. 
Smith came up the two steps which raised from 
the sidewalk to the shop threshold with the back 
of the seersucker coat still grasped in his defiling 
hand, at the moment that Noggle, purple, pop- 
eyed, panting, whirled round and faced him, a com¬ 
mand like a cough in his dry throat. 

“Don’t y’u come in—don’t y’u come in!” he 
panted. 

But Smith was already in, and Noggle backed 
before him to a corner. There, with his thin back 
to the wall, his own floor beneath his feet, his chair 
on one hand, his hot water tank on the other, and 
no possibility of escape through the door, his soul 
began to enlarge with the desperate determination 
to fight. 

Old Zeb Smith stood before him, red spines of 
beard on his dirty face, his red flannel shirt open 
on his hairy chest, crouching from the knees, his 
hands fixed to spring and tear. 


348 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


Noggle seized a razor, the hot water of a cow¬ 
ard’s courage in his eyes, swiped with it, slashed 
with it, brought it around in bright, confusing whirl 
in front of Zeb Smith’s face. Smith fell back a 
step, growling in his bearded neck, winking his 
red eyes as if a hot iron had been thrust under his 
nose. 

“Git out! Git out!” Noggle commanded, his 
courage bristling on his narrow back like hairs. 

“Gimme ten dollars and I’ll leave you alone,” 
said Smith. 

“No, I won’t—no, I won’t!” Noggle answered, 
cheered and strengthened to heroic endeavors by 
the gathering crowd before his door. 

“Gimme—” 

Whether Zeb Smith had it in mind to raise his 
demand, or to lower to a compromise, no man ever 
heard. For his words broke in horrified, shiver¬ 
ing exclamation as Noggle’s bright razor darted and 
slashed and snipped the end of his nose off as if it 
were a green cucumber. 

Smith clapped his hand to the end of his nose 
in time to catch the fragment as it fell. Terrified 
beyond expression, he gazed a moment, clamped the 
bleeding parent stem between finger and thumb and, 
with the severed portion tightly clasped in the other 
hand, ran bellowing from the shop. 

It wasn’t a very big piece that Noggle had cut 


AN AMAZING EXODUS 


349 


from the end of Smith’s nose, perhaps not much 
bigger than a silver quarter, but it must have looked 
the size of a wagon-wheel to Zeb as he ran with it 
in his hand to the doctor’s office. There he pre¬ 
sented it, holding hard to the end of his nose to 
check the flow of blood, with a thick request that 
it be immediately attached to its proper surround¬ 
ings. 

The doctor was a short man with a black beard, 
which was red at times for half an inch next his 
skin, as business might press, or the coloring mat¬ 
ter be slow about reaching him from Kansas City. 
He was a saw-and-calomel survival of the Civil 
War, a vituperative man, full of strange and dis¬ 
quieting oaths. He looked on Smith, his bleeding 
nose, his extended fragment, and cursed him by 
all the gods in his uncommon vocabulary. 

a It’s a pity he didn’t cut your dam’ head off, you 
old soak! No, I won’t sew it on! I won’t touch 
you, you old skunk!” 

Smith implored his compassion, still offering 
the little piece of red nose-end, fiery yet, though 
drained of blood. The doctor cursed him again, 
and turned from him. Smith stood looking at the 
bit of flesh in his hand, breathing through his 
mouth with a loud noise. “Can’t you put it back, 
doc? My looks’ll be ruined!” he said. 

With that the swearing doctor turned to him 


350 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


again, ordered him to sit down, examined the cut. 

“It wouldn’t take, you old fool!” he said. 

Smith insisted that he had heard of such things 
being done, but the doctor gave him no heed. He 
set about bandaging the nose, chuckling to himself 
from time to time behind Smith’s back. 

“Yes, it might be done,” he said, when he had 
the injured nose wrapped and stuck over with ad¬ 
hesive tape, “but I’m not prepared to do it, Smith. 
You’ve got to have human grafting-wax for a job 
like this, and I’m all out. If you could keep that 
piece of nose fresh till you go to Kansas City, they 
could do it for you there.” 

“Lord, doc, I ain’t got the money to go there on! ” 

“Would you go if I got your ticket, Zeb?” 

“I would if I could keep that piece fresh till I 
get there.” 

“I’ll fix it for you; I’ll get a chunk of ice. We’ll 
wrap it up and put it in a box on the ice, and it’ll 
keep as fresh as a fish.” 

Smith was on hand to take the train for Kansas 
City, a large dripping box in his hand, a ticket in 
his pocket for which the money of Ollie Noggle 
had paid. For the barber realized very well that 
this was the cheapest and easiest way of ridding 
himself of Smith for many a day to come. It was 
one thing for him to go to Kansas City on a pro- 


AN AMAZING EXODUS 351 

vided ticket, and another for him to come back on 
one bought by himself. 

The doctor was there to watch Zeb aboard, and 
to caution him in all gravity to get more ice out of 
the water-cooler in case the chunk in his box should 
run low. And so Zeb Smith departed from Cot¬ 
tonwood. Whether he ever came back is not a 
matter that concerns us now. Certainly he was 
not seen there again in the brief time that remains 
to the portion of this diminishing tale. 


CHAPTER XXVI 


>< A * 

A' 


JOURNEY S END 

ND you’re a goin’ to wear your shoes,” said 
Uncle Boley. 

“Yes, sir, I’ll save my boots till I get 
back in the saddle again. I’d only wear ’em out 
trampin’ along over the road in ’em, sir—they’re 
too good for that.” 

“If I had my way, Texas, you never would leave 
this country on foot. You’d go on a train or a 
horse, if I had my say. Oh, well, if I had my 
downright way, you wouldn’t leave at all.” 

“You’ve been too kind to me already, Uncle 
Boley, and I haven’t done anything in return but 
show you what a fool feller I am for mussin’ and 
muddlin’ things up. I’m through here; if I was 
to stay on any longer I’d get my foot into it again, 
somehow, and I’ll just bet you a purty I would.” 

They were in Uncle Boley’s shop, and it was 
late afternoon of the day following Fannie Good¬ 
night’s death. They had seen her lowered into her 
bed in the bare, melancholy cemetery, and Texas 
was now making ready for the road. The work 
that time had been saving for him in Cottonwood, 
352 


353 


JOURNEY’S END 

as he often thought, was finished. His listening 
and straining, hopes and heart-burnings were at an 
end in that place. As he came to Cottonwood, like 
a bird blown far from its native haunts by the 
storm, so he would leave. 

He had gathered nothing but sorrow there, and 
cares which left their mark in new lines in his 
solemn, homely face. Perhaps, in the great prear¬ 
rangement, there had been something else set down 
to his labors beyond that unfriendly land. A man 
must go on until he found his place. 

His boots were rolled in his blanket, together 
with his brave black coat. This roll he must carry 
on his back, for he hadn’t money enough left out 
of the expense of Fannie’s burial to buy one leg of 
a horse. 

Hartwell’s last word had thrown Uncle Boley 
into a silent and speculative spell. He sat on his 
work-bench out of old habit, although dressed in 
his alpaca coat and derby hat, looking out of his 
dusty window with fixed stare. 

“Yes, that might be so, might be so,” he sighed. 
“Change and doin’s seems to be the lot of some 
folks, peace and easy goin’ of others. I’ve been 
makin’ boots for fifty years and more, and I’ve 
made many a pair that men’s tromped off in to git 
rich, or git shot, but I’ve just kep’ right on makin’ 
boots. It wasn’t laid out for me to do anything 


354 THE TRAIL RIDER 

else, I reckon; I couldn’t ’a’ changed it if I’d V 
tried.” 

“Maybe not, sir.” 

“I was aimin’ and hopin’ to see you settled down 
here, Texas. There must be something laid out 
for you besides roamin’ and lookin’ and never 
findin’. I wish I could tell you what it is.” 

“I wish I could tell myself, Uncle Boley, sir.” 

“I’m put out, and I’m put out worse than I ever 
was over anything in my life, over the way Sallie’s 
acted up. It ain’t like her—she must know them 
cow-men cleared you, and she ought to be big 
enough to come in here like a man and tell you 
she’s glad.” 

“Maybe she isn’t a bit glad, sir,” said Texas, 
sadly. 

“Yes, she is, dang her little melts! She’s holdin’ 
Fannie ag’in you, that’s what’s eatin’ her. Well, 
if she knew—” 

“She mustn’t know, sir,” Texas interposed, hast¬ 
ily. “Anyhow, not till I’m gone and out of the 
way.” 

“I ain’t decided she deserves to know at all, 
Texas. If a woman ain’t got faith enough in a 
man—” 

“You can’t blame her, sir, at all. It looked bad 
—even you thought I wasn’t straight for a little 
while.” 


355 


JOURNEY’S END 

“But I guess it might be good for her to tell her, 
when you’re gone, and let her grieve. Snap judg¬ 
ment ain’t fair to a man, and it’s harder on a 
woman, every time. I took it on you that day, but 
I wasn’t so bull-headed I couldn’t be reasoned out 
of it, was I, Texas?” 

“You’ve al-ways been mighty liberal with me, 
Uncle Boley, even when things looked bad.” 

“Yes, and I wanted you to like Sallie, tooth and 
toe-nail, dang the luck! But I’m done with 
women, I’m through. I ain’t a goin’ to marry no 
more; I’m a goin’ to take my pen in hand to-night 
and write to that girl up in Topeky and tell her 
she don’t need to bother about cornin’ down to look 
at m’ teeth, I’ll tell her I lost the last one of ’em 
I could chaw on this afternoon.” 

Texas said nothing, although he applauded 
Uncle Boley’s resolution in his heart. For he 
knew that if Gertie Moorehead ever came to Cot¬ 
tonwood she would marry the old man for his pen¬ 
sion. There was the look of a home-hunter in her 
starved eyes, as hungry as a lost hound’s. 

“I guess Sallie and her mother woti’t be needin’ 
me no more, either, since they’ve got money agin,” 
Uncle Boley said, very sadly. 

“Surely, sir, that never can make any difference 
between them and you. Gratitude for what you’ve 
been to them will hold them your friends.” 


356 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


“You can’t tell, Texas. Money makes a big dif¬ 
ference in people sometimes. Well, sir, there’s a 
good many people here thinks they ought to turn 
that money over to the bank directors till they can 
straighten things up. You know, Stott never men¬ 
tioned that forged note, and nobody else but me 
and you and Johnnie Mackey knows. Maybe Sal- 
lie she’ll be fool enough to give it up.” 

“She mustn’t be allowed to, sir, you must tell 
the people of this town about the forgery, and tell 
Miss Sallie about it as soon as I’m gone, I expect. 
Give poor little Fannie the credit for it all, Uncle 
Boley, and keep my name out of it as much as you 
can. I was only the instrument, she was the force 
back of it.” 

“I’ll think it over, Texas, and I’ll figger out what 
to tell her, somehow. I guess your first stop’ll be 
at Colby’s ranch?” 

“Yes, sir, I’ll go there and tell Fannie’s relations. 
Maybe they’ll need a hand this fall, and I can 
work there long enough to buy me a horse. If I 
can, I’ll ride back here and see you before I light 
out for home—for Taixas—down on the Nueces, 
sir, where I used to be at.” 

“I’d give—if I was young and could go with you, 
Texas—I’d give all the world owes me, or ever 
owed me. I’d give it all! ” 

It was almost sundown when Uncle Boley and 


357 


JOURNEY’S END 

Texas paused for their parting on the southern edge 
of Cottonwood. Uncle Boley had insisted on go¬ 
ing with him that far, clinging pathetically to his 
slipping hold on this friend of his age. 

“It’ll be dark before you’ve went very fur, 
Texas,” he said, putting off the last word in the 
useless way that one will do when parting is in¬ 
evitable, and the bitterness of tears is rising to the 
tongue. 

“It won’t matter, Uncle Boley; I can foller my 
way.” 

Texas stood looking off into the south, his head 
held high, his blanket in a military roll over his 
shoulder. 

“There’s not much down there for me but recol¬ 
lections now, but a man loves the place that’s been 
kind to him, and his feet ache to start back to it 
when his troubles come too fast.” 

“Maybe you won’t like it when you git back there, 
Texas?” Uncle Boley spoke hopefully, looking 
up at his young friend’s yearning face. 

“No man can tell, sir.” 

“If you don’t, you can come back; you can al¬ 
ways come back, Texas.” 

“Sir, thank you kindly. And I’ll be rackin’ 
on.” 

Texas unbuckled the revolver that Uncle Boley 
had given him and handed it back to the old man. 


358 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


“What’re you aimin’ to do, Texas?” Uncle Boley 
inquired in surprise. 

“I’ve worn it, sir, to the last minute, hatin’ to 
give it up, but this is our partin’-line, Uncle Boley, 
and I’m puttin’ it back in your hands. You gave 
it to me, and I’m restorin’ it through you to Miss 
Sallie. Give it to her, sir, and tell her the man that 
wore it last went away with a doubt in his heart of 
his worthiness. She never come to say a word! ” 

Uncle Boley took the pistol without protest, for 
there was not the strength of protest in his crushed 
old heart. He could see Texas in wavering outline 
through his tears, and Texas was still looking away 
into the south like one watching the receding shores 
of country and home. 

“I’m going away from you-all, Uncle Boley, sir,” 
he said, “but I’m leavin’ my heart staked out here 
behind me. It’ll pull back on me like a rock.” 

He turned to the old man in a moment, his face 
illumined by his transforming smile. 

“Good-by, Uncle Boley, and good luck to you, 
sir, wherever you may be.” 

Uncle Boley’s farewell choked in his throat. He 
clung to Hartwell’s hand and went trailing beside 
him, toddling like a child, heartbroken to see him 
go. Texas patted his hand as if giving him as¬ 
surance and benediction, gently broke his clasp, and 
hurried down the slope. 


359 


JOURNEY’S END 

The old man stood looking after him until he 
mounted the knoll beyond, and passed over the top 
out of sight. Then he returned to the spot where 
he had dropped the revolver, and sat down, his 
forehead bowed upon his knees, and wept. 

There came the sound of a horse slowly ridden 
through the grass, its quickening pace, its sudden 
stopping close behind his back. Uncle Boley re¬ 
sented this trespass upon his grief, for he was far 
from any traversed road, out on the unfenced, un¬ 
mown prairie lands. He did not lift his head. 

Somebody came running to his side; he could 
hear the short breath of excitement. 

“Why, Uncle Boley! What’s the matter—are 
you hurt?” 

“Yes, Sallie, I’m hurt; I’m hurt bad!” 

She was on her knees beside him, stroking his 
hand, looking into his face with fright in her sor¬ 
rowful brown eyes, anxiety in her sympathetic 
voice. 

“Who did it?” she whispered, the sight of the 
revolver, which she knew too well, bringing a rush 
of horrible, strangling suspicion. 

“You done it!” said Uncle Boley, bitterly. He 
disengaged her hand, pushed her away, got to his 
feet. 

“I did it? Why, Uncle Boley, I wouldn’t—” 

“I was a friend to you, and I stood by you—here, 


360 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


take this gun and go on home, before I say some¬ 
thing to you that don’t become me!” 

Sallie stood looking at him, her face bloodless, 
making no effort to take the proffered weapon. 

“The man that wore it last left it here a little 
while ago and walked away over that hill, and left 
my old age as barren as the top of a rock. I’ve 
lived nearly eighty year, and I’ve got to meet the 
man that’s equal to him in honor and kindness of 
heart—but he’s gone. He said for me to hand this 
gun back to you. Here—take it, and go on home! ” 

She reached out for it, but her eyes were not with 
her hand. She was looking away into the south, 
with something of the same yearning in her face as 
the old man had seen in Hartwell’s but a little while 
before. 

“Isn’t he coming back any more, Uncle Boley?” 
she asked, her voice very small, a tremor in it, no 
pride in her quick young heart. 

“What’s he got to come back for? His work’s 
done.” 

She dropped the heavy pistol and belt at her 
feet, and a little flush of color came into her face. 

“I suppose his world is empty now,” she said. 

“Well, yours ain’t,” said Uncle Boley, rather 
sharply. “You’ve got your sixty thousand dollars, 
but you wouldn’t ’a’ had sixty cents if it hadn’t been 
for that poor girl we put away under the sod to-day. 


361 


JOURNEY’S END 

Yes, you can look up, and jump, and turn white. 
You ain’t worthy to drop a clod as big as the end 
of your finger on her coffin, Miss Sallie McCoy!” 

“Oh, Uncle Boley, what do you mean?” she 
appealed. 

“This has been a day of partin’ and goin’s 
away,” said Uncle Boley heavily. “I’ll set down, 
Sallie, and I’ll tell you something you’ve got to 
know for the good of your soul.” 

She dropped to the grass beside him, afraid of 
his portentous manner, shocked by the seeming bru¬ 
tality of his words. Uncle Boley sat a little while 
looking in the direction that Hartwell had gone, 
and by and by he took off his hat and laid it on 
the grass at his side. 

“Well, he’s gone now; I’ll not be breakin’ my 
word to him if I tell you, Sallie. I guess it’s only 
right for you to know, no matter if it does take the 
hide off somewhere.” 

So Uncle Boley told her the story of Fannie 
Goodnight, and how she came into Texas Hart¬ 
well’s life, and what she had been to him. And 
when he came to that part of it Sallie covered her 
face with her hands and burst out crying, sobbing 
and moaning as if the grave had opened at her feet 
and swallowed the best that the world contained 
for her. 

“I knew he didn’t care for her—I knew he was 


362 THE TRAIL RIDER 

honest—and I was ashamed to go back and tell 
him! ” 

“Just a fool fit of jealousy, and look what you 
done.” 

“He’s gone away thinkin’ I’m ungrateful, and a 
mean, proud, foolish thing! ” 

“Maybe not. He was too good and square to 
think hard of other folks, especially when he— 
where’ve you been trapesin’ around to, Sallie?” 

“I went down to Duncan’s night before last, 
Uncle Boley. I’m going home.” 

“Oh, you did? Had to go down and let ’em 
know you’re rich agin, did you?” 

“I went to take him the word that Stott sent us 
before he ran away with the bank’s money, Uncle 
Boley.” 

“Did that dish-faced Dutch houn’ send word to 
you that Texas wasn’t to blame for them fever cat¬ 
tle, Sallie?” 

“Yes, Uncle Boley,” she replied softly, her face 
turned away still, the flush deeper over her cheeks 
and neck. 

“And you took your horse in the night and went 
tearin’ off to Duncan’s alone to tell him?” 

“It wasn’t anything to what she—the other one— 
did for him,” she said, her words almost a whisper, 
her eyes cast down. 

“No,” Uncle Boley admitted, with ungenerous 


JOURNEY’S END 363 

readiness, it seemed, “it wasn’t. But every little 
helps, Sallie; every little helps. It shows your 
heart wasn’t half as foolish as your tongue.” 

She put her arm around the old man’s neck and 
suddenly hid her face on his shoulder, crying again 
as if there was nothing left between the seas to 
console her. 

“I loved him so, Uncle Boley! Oh, I loved him 
so!” 

Uncle Boley stroked her hair, the light back in 
his kind blue eyes. He felt her body shake with 
the grief that hurt her soul. 

“Well, I don’t know what we can do about it now, 
Sallie,” he said. But a smile moved his beard as 
he looked southward and saw a figure rise a little 
hill, and stand a moment as if already the back¬ 
ward strain of his heart was making his road harder 
than he could bear. 

A little while; Sallie sat up again. She laid her 
hand tenderly on the stock of the pistol that Texas 
had left behind. 

“I wish he had his gun, Uncle Boley.” 

“I reckon he does too, Sallie. But he felt he 
didn’t have no right to it without a word from you.” 

“Did he—did he—buy a new one, Uncle Boley?” 

“No, he never, Sallie. Just took it off down here 
and handed it to me and went on his way without 
no more gun on him than a rabbit.” 


364 


THE TRAIL RIDER 


“I wish he had it,” said she, looking anxiously 
over the prairie. 

She stood on her knees, looking still; but Texas 
had passed over the knoll and out of sight. Uncle 
Boley smiled. There was another knoll beyond, 
and another, and onward to the horizon, like the 
swells of a peaceful sea. 

“I wish he had it,” she said again, slowly, her 
voice very sad and low, as if she whispered her wish 
after him to find him on his lonely way. 

“Well, if I was as young as I was sixty years ago 
I’d hop a horse and take it to him. But I ain’t; I 
ain’t been on a horse no tellin’ when.” 

Sallie was standing, looking away into the hazy 
south, straining forward a little, her lips open, her 
breath coming fast. 

“How long has he been gone, Uncle Boley?” 

“Oh, fifteen or twenty minutes.” 

“He can’t be very far away yet.” 

“No, I don’t reckon he’s so fur a horse couldn’t 
ketch him.” 

“Why, I believe—I do—I do see him!” 

“Sure enough!” said Uncle Boley, feigning great 
surprise. “Well, darn that feller’s slow shanks! 
he ain’t went more’n a mile.” 

“Do you suppose he’d think—if I went, do you 
suppose—” 

“No tellin’,” Uncle Boley replied gravely, his 


JOURNEY’S END 365 

blue eyes growing brighter, his old beard twitching 
as if a wind moved in it about his lips. 

Sallie was straining as if she projected her soul 
into the south after the lone traveler who stood 
dark-lined against the sky. She held her hands out 
as if she called him; the cool wind of sunset was in 
her light-moving hair. 

“Would you come back, Texas, if I’d go to you 
and tell you I’m sorry and unworthy, but lonesome 
—oh, so lonesome! Would you come back— 
home?” 

She seemed unconscious of Uncle Boley’s pres¬ 
ence, calling her appeal after that dark figure no 
bigger in the distance than a finger held against the 
sky. The old man took the revolver from the 
ground, threw the belt over the pommel of her sad¬ 
dle, and came leading the horse forward. Uncle 
Boley made a gesture with his hand as if sweeping 
her away. She leaped into the saddle and galloped 
swiftly to her heart’s desire. 

The old man stood looking after her as the south 
drew her on, smaller with the rising of each suc¬ 
cessive swell. 

“Her heart’s a flyin’ to him like a dove,” he said. 
“Well, do you reckon he’ll come back?” 





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